This week's Grapevine brings you information fresh from the paddock on: Michelin Man's Plan Da Matta Feeling the Pressure

Michelin Man's Plan

With the change in the tyre rules for the new season, there has been a lot of planning going on at the tyre manufacturers, as they decide how to achieve the best possible results for their teams over the coming year. Michelin, at least, now have an idea of what that is going to involve…

Michelin's winter testing programme is proceeding as originally established at the end of last season: the teams are working off the baseline specification arrived at before Christmas, which gives them a consistent platform for testing. Specimen tyres are being carted out to tests, with most of the teams keeping a car on the track almost continuously to work through the effects of heat-cycles, scrubbing, and plain endurance.

Based on work with their hybrid 2002/03 cars, most of the teams have broadly identified the characteristics they want to change, in order to optimise the current baseline tyre for their car. Over the coming month, this work is going to be formalised for each team so that as the baseline moves, as it must for each race, the individual tyres for the teams can be created, without exhaustive additional testing.

Between now and mid-February, the teams are being offered a number of tyres to test, in preparation for the opening races of the season. Unsurprisingly, the bulk of the work is split between Williams and McLaren: as the teams with the biggest testing budgets, they are getting the lion's share.

Despite the attention on these grooved tyres, wet weather tyres are far from forgotten. Embarrassed by being unable to compete at a raining Silverstone last season, Michelin have been building on their wet programme, looking for a strategy that might give them the chance to compete effectively with Bridgestone. And they are optimistic about where it is headed.

In tests, Michelin's new wet weather tyre is looking very impressive. As they are only permitted a single wet tyre at events now, it has to be able to deal with a wide range of wet conditions, from a light drizzle to heavy rain. Accordingly, the tyre has to be sufficiently treaded that it will displace significant standing water from heavy rain, yet resilient enough to be used for a reasonable distance on a drying track.

Optimising for a lot of standing water usually involves numerous, wide grooves, making the tyres as soft as possible, and a low operating temperature. These characteristics are precisely the opposite of what is required for a drying track: they make it prone to overheating, and disintegrating. Similarly, a tyre that does well on a relatively dry track usually just doesn't shift enough water to be effective on a very wet surface.

The answer to Michelin's dilemma, ironically, seems to have come straight out of the Silverstone Grand Prix. The constructors' single highlight, was watching Juan Pablo Montoya racing in something like a competitive fashion on a drying track, with full wet tyres. Basically, they wore down, and as the tread disappeared, the performance returned.

Of course, that wasn't quite what was intended, at the time, but for the new season, it is another story. Michelin are now in a position to put together a tyre that performs well in the wet, but as the track dries, and the tyre starts to overheat, it wears: the characteristics are expected to be somewhat similar to the 'drop off' experienced by the 2001 dry tyres.

Whether it will work in practice, or the FIA will ban it if it does, remains to be seen; in the meanwhile, however, it does mean that Michelin's plan could give them a chance to redress the embarrassment of Silverstone.

Da Matta Feeling the Pressure

Cristiano da Matta is starting to wonder if, perhaps, this time he has bitten off a bit more than he can chew. Having taken the CART Championship, da Matta was enticed to Formula One by Toyota, to start up what should be an extended stay in the team, as they work their way up the performance ladder.

In order to entice the driver over from the States, Toyota have made a number of promises concerning the car they will deliver this season; indeed, they even committed to hiring at least one driver with an established testing pedigree. Of course, Olivier Panis was not hired for his testing skills alone: after performing on a par with Jacques Villeneuve for a couple of seasons, half the paddock considers him one of the best value for money on the park. Experienced, quick, consistent, keen as mustard, and a known quantity, Panis is an impressive barometer for performance.

To date, da Matta has been having an eventful time, as he struggles to come to terms with the TF102B – which, whilst not the best car of last season, is certainly a fair example of the Formula One genre. Ironically, it seems that the very things that made him so useful in a Champ car, are causing him to struggle in the new medium. Da Matta's speed is based on his car control – he feels for the limits of performance, and adjusts the car to run on the limit… though it's not quite that simple. In fact, he establishes the limit by overdriving the car, continually adjusting to recovering it from falling off the track. Formula One cars are known for being noticeably less forgiving than their CART brethren, generally making overdriving an expensive pastime. Whilst Montoya, who also likes to overdrive, adjusted to the sensitivity in short order, da Matta is struggling.

As if da Matta hadn't enough stress, when youngsters like Nico Rosberg test – for winning the BMW ADAC Championship, he was awarded a test day with the BMW-Williams team – and find themselves only a couple of seconds off the pace of the established drivers in the same car, it puts pressure on the far more experienced drivers to perform.

Adding insult to injury, the very driver aids that allow relatively inexperienced (if talented) drivers to put on such a display, are the biggest obstacle to da Matta's transition. Keeping the car on the limit requires faith in these aids – particularly, knowing that the traction assistance really will control the back end of the car, whilst it feels as though it should be sliding out.

Until da Matta has established how to get the best out of the car, he cannot really get to grips with providing direction for its development. In the meanwhile, Olivier Panis is on the case, and whilst the improvements he asks for are undoubtedly going to be useful for both drivers, it's Panis' priorities that are going to be met. The longer that goes on, the steeper the slope da Matta has to climb to get on terms with his teammate...

Given the work he has put in, da Matta is getting frustrated. In his own mind, there is so much to learn about what goes on in and around the car, and away from the track, that being focussed on getting up to speed is becoming a big deal. He is intent on succeeding in Formula One, and is all too aware that the modern champion has to be a master of every aspect of the game. Anything that has the potential to offer the slightest advantage must be leveraged.

To date, Toyota has been patient with da Matta's progress. The driver has been working hard, and taken every opportunity to get out and test. Whilst disappointed that he is not immediately on the pace, it was always expected to take some time. So much so, that their conservative view was that getting on terms with Panis by mid-season would be considered a good adjustment. Which is a lot more generous than da Matta is prepared to be with himself!