The wet weather which marked the first free practice session for the 2013 6 Hours of Silverstone provided MICHELIN’s partners in all the classes with a chance to evaluate the French firm’s range of wet weather rubber.

The exercise allowed them to identify the operating windows for each type, as Serge GRISIN, the manager of MICHELIN’s four-wheel motorsport programmes, explains: “Today’s conditions were very complex. They were so changeable that tyre choice was far more complicated than expected. Along with our partners, however, we took advantage of the situation to measure the performance differences between our different wet weather tyres in completely wet and merely damp conditions. Given the weather that is being predicted for Sunday, it was good preparation for the race…”

In the LM P1 class, MICHELIN’s partners chiefly ran ‘Wets’ (36/71-18) and compared them to the ‘Full Wets’ which is capable of clearing even more water. When the rain stopped and the track began to dry a little, the LM P1 prototypes switched to the MICHELIN HYBRID, an ‘intermediate slick’. They are easier to spot this tyre this year because they feature a special MICHELIN Total Performance* marking on a white background. The TOYOTAs ran these tyres for several laps, whereas AUDI and REBELLION only used them for one ‘flying’ lap.

In the GTE Pro class, FERRARI AF Corse, PORSCHE AG Team Manthey and ASTON MARTIN Racing used the session to measure the difference between their ‘Wets’ and ‘Full Wets’, while the LM P2 and GTE AM teams were able to choose from the MICHELIN ‘Wet’ and the patterned ‘Intermediate’, in compliance with the regulations which apply to these two categories.

Source : Michelin