This weekend will see the 2016 MotoGP championship draw to a close at the Circuito Comunidad Valenciana Ricardo Tormo in Spain, with the potential for fans to see a record tenth different race winner in a single season.
The championship may have already been decided, but for Michelin this weekend marks the beginning of their preparations for 2017.
One thing yet to be decided is the 3rd place in the championship, with Maverick Viñales looking to reign in the man he is going to replace at Yamaha next season, Jorge Lorenzo.
Meanwhile, after two crashes in his last two races since being crowned champion, Marc Marquez will be looking to steady the ship and take a sixth career victory at Valencia. Teammate Dani Pedrosa also returns after missing the last three races due to a broken collarbone sustained in a pre-race incident at Motegi.
The only stadium circuit on the calendar, the anti-clockwise design features 14 corners – nine left-handers versus five right-handers along with a straight of just 650m, which is approached by a very fast left turn.
With the extra left corners, Michelin has brought a range of Power Slick tyres which will feature an asymmetric design – with a harder left-hand shoulder – for both the front and rear allocation. Available in medium (no band) and hard (yellow band) for the front, along with soft (white band) and medium (no band) for the rear, the tyres are aimed to give the riders the best choice to use in the colder morning temperatures that are common at the circuit in November, right through to the warmer conditions that are usually experienced when race-day afternoon arrives.
Michelin’s provision of tyres for the MotoGP field will also include the Power Rain in extra soft (light blue band), soft (blue band) and medium (no band) for both the front and rear, plus the Power Inters being made available if there are mixed conditions or a drying track.
Piero Taramasso – Manager of the Two-Wheel Motorsport Group at Michelin stated:
“Valencia signifies our last race of 2016, but it also means it’s the start of 2017 because we have an important test in the week after the race. We have had an interesting season with lots of different challenges, mostly from the weather, so we are hoping that will not play a part this weekend. We learned a lot from the post-race test at Valencia last year and that set us on our way for 2016 and we will be going to this race with very different tyres to what we had this time last year. The circuit can be cold in the mornings and it doesn’t give much grip, so we have a range that we hope will cope with these conditions. That said though, with so many corners the edges of the tyres don’t have much chance to cool down and with the extra number of left-hand corners, including the fast final turn, we have asymmetric tyres with harder left-hand shoulders for front and rear to cope with those kinds of stresses.”
