Michelin again became the target of criticism during the weekend of the Grand Prix of Argentina MotoGP when Scott Redding suffered with the rear tire burst burst during the fourth free practice on Saturday. During the preseason, Loriz Baz suffered a similar problem in Sepang, in the middle of the pit straight.
In Argentina, the initial response of the French manufacturer was to force the teams to use a rear tire with a composition but tough, but such a plan could not be implemented due to bad weather on Sunday morning, when a test compound was scheduled.
In the end, the final decision for the race was to reduce the number of laps - 25 to 20 - and established a mandatory motorcycle trade in half of the race. Jorge Lorenzo, one of those who openly criticized the Michelin after the bursting suffered Redding, expressed concern about the situation of the French rubber to Austin.
"The situation with Michelin is quite complicated because we do not know what tires they will give us in Austin, which is a track which generally requires much softer tires than Argentina," he said.
"It may be that, for security reasons, they provide harder tires. - Even harder than we used in the race in Spa is complicated, but I hope we do not have more episodes like Baz and Redding. but do not depend on us, it depends on Michelin, "he said.
After the accident, he came up to hypothesize, to be among the highest drivers on the grid - Baz measures 1,91m and 1,85m Redding - their weight would have influenced the rubber overflows. In the incident with Baz, Michelin put the blame on Avintia, which would have put a very low pressure in the tires of the French Ducati. Lorenzo, however, was not convinced with this explanation.
"Nobody knows exactly what happened: it was a puncture, as some say, or something with the tire pressure Some say the pressure of his tire was within the standards but I do not think that a rider weighing 100 kg or.. using half the pressure should suffer a type problem, "he added.
SOURCE: motorsport