The new banked final corner being built for F1 at Zandvoort will mean drivers have to use ‘painfully’ high tyre pressures, says Max Verstappen.
The Dutch Grand Prix will return on the 2020 F1 calendar at the seaside circuit which last held a round of the world championship in 1985.Track designers Dromo, who are planning modifications to the circuit to bring it into line with modern F1 standards, intend to add banking of up to 18 degrees at the last corner on the track, the Arie Luyendijkbocht. This is being done to reduce the amount of run-off needed at the corner and allow drivers to tackle it flat-out while using DRS, to aid overtaking.
However F1’s official tyre supplier Pirelli has warned minimum tyre pressures will need to be set high to ensure tyres can withstand the banking. Max Verstappen admitted this will mean “it’s going to be low on grip” around the rest of the track.
“If it makes us follow a bit easier with the DRS open already, I think it’s good,” he said in response to a question from RaceFans. “To go even higher on tyre pressures I think is a bit painful but at the end of the day you also don’t want blow-outs so I can understand for Pirelli of course that they want to do that.”
Verstappen, who has been kept abreast of the planned changes at what will be his home round of the world championship, said he expects the banking will be “quite severe”.
Daniil Kvyat, who won a Formula Three race at the circuit in 2013, said the banked corner will be “super cool” and believes drivers will cope with the higher tyre pressures.
“The tyre pressures, usually if they’re higher you lose some grip so we just have to drive it I guess. Nothing we can do about it.
“We drive a car and the way they give it to us and if for the safety we have to do it then we have to accept that there’s nothing to be done. The decision has been taken I guess and we need to make it work some way.”
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Nitzo (@webtel)
20th June 2019, 12:23
Every enterprise/company hopes to have employees like this.
Not sure if such people are easy to find these days.
Paul (@frankjaeger)
20th June 2019, 13:16
Good shout, Daniil! Let’s make a good corner, if the pressures have to be high, so be it. If it means less grip on other parts of the track, great, more unpredictability and sliding about.
Victor (@mrmuffins)
20th June 2019, 13:28
I always thought “road relevance” meant relevant to the road, but in Pirelli’s case, it means making the roads relevant to the car.
DAllein (@)
20th June 2019, 13:41
It is not Pirelli who came up and prepares this atrocity.
erikje
20th June 2019, 19:37
@dallein
explain, i do not have the faintest idea what you mean.
rpaco
20th June 2019, 13:41
Wait until next year with low profile tyres!
The suspension will actually be in the geometry and not in the side walls of the tyres.
A whole new era with real suspension!
DAllein (@)
20th June 2019, 13:43
Worry not, if it comes in early May, the race at snow-covered track will be successfully cancelled.
(yes, I will be chanting this until it happens next year)
Mountblanc
20th June 2019, 14:09
Keep on dreaming ! It hardly snows in The Netherlands in Januari and Februari. Besides Zandvoort is next to the sea where its much warmer in the winter due to the sea temperature.
DAllein (@)
21st June 2019, 10:04
Keep dreaming!
erikje
20th June 2019, 19:39
snow in may in the Nethelands?
It seems you have something against Zanvoort..
why? just hormones or some arguments?
DAllein (@)
21st June 2019, 10:03
This year it was snowing in SPA… at the same weekend. And WEC-race got red-flagged
And Zandvoort’s temperatures hovered around 6-12C
You’ll see next year.
Joao (@johnmilk)
20th June 2019, 13:55
We don’t have this on calendar and we are talking about tyres already
Euro Brun (@eurobrun)
20th June 2019, 14:25
What are the odds on an 11th hour tyre chicane to be hastily constructed ahead of the corner to slow speeds onto the banking? I fancy a cheeky £10 bet.
Or a permanent yellow flag zone to stop risky overtaking moves, like at the Melco hairpin in Macau.
I hope they can just grow up and deal with it. As said above, hopefully the excessive high pressures will make the rest of the lap more difficult.
NS Biker (@rekibsn)
20th June 2019, 20:10
The corner is being designed to be “flat out with DRS open”. Sounds a lot like a straight.
Should be a good spectator area, but no grandstands, just some grassy banks.
The concept of building a banked, high speed corner to avoid the cost of a larger run-off area, while I understand the physics and logic, sorry, this one just doesn’t seem right.
Jason (@jmwalley)
21st June 2019, 15:58
For reference of what 18° of banking is like: Indianapolis Motor Speedway’s corners are 9.2° and the start-finish line at Daytona International Speedway is 18°. (The steep turns at Daytona are 31°.)