One of the biggest changes to the World Endurance Championship (WEC) regulations for 2023 is the loss of tyre warmers in all classes in the WEC. The governing bodies, Automobile Club de l’Ouest and the FIA, announced that tyre warmers would be scrapped from both the WEC and European Le Mans Series this year in a move “designed to reduce the teams’ environmental impact”.
Although this was common in other racing series, such as IMSA’s WeatherTech Sportscar Championship, it’s new to the world championship and there has been resistance from some teams, saying it does not help the environment if a car crashes on cold tyres. In response, the regulators point to the fact that qualifying has been increased from 10 to 15 minutes to help generate tyre temperature, increasing the time on track.
However, tyre supplier, Michelin, offers the same product for both series, despite the fact the WEC tracks are traditionally more abrasive than those in the US. It says tyre warming should not be an issue.
‘The regulation is the same for everyone,’ says Vasselon of the new rules. ‘Even if it sets a challenge to all the teams, we all know it’s a necessary challenge. There is no discussion on that. Probably the reason why the decision came so late was that we all had to make sure our tyre supplier was ready on time.
‘We also have to consider that it’s more of a challenge in winter, especially for us when we are only testing in Europe for cost reasons. Europe is on the cold side in winter, and this makes it more difficult. We will pay attention to managing the cold tyres, but it will be less of a challenge to manage the cold tyres with 35 degrees on the ground at Sebring than at Paul Ricard with two degrees at night.’
The tyres are also different compared to last year, and in the early 2023 races, Porsche and Cadillac stole a march on the LMH manufacturers, having received them in December for a test at Daytona and then raced them in the Daytona 24 hours in January.
That extra mileage in race conditions may help them on the low-grip circuit at Sebring, but the LMH manufacturers have tested on European tracks, unlike Cadillac, which so far has only tested in the US.
‘The tyres definitely require some special handling,’ concludes Vasselon. ‘From the car set-up side, as well as the driver side, but I’m not going to elaborate on it.’
