the garage trying to see what kind of tyres we were using. There was probably no one else in the world using Metzeler tyres on short circuits because Metzeler couldn’t afford to travel to places like Japan. We had to do all the work on the tyres ourselves, although they advised us on pressures and the like before we went.
I had a crap race, finishing 13th but picking up a few valuable points towards my next world title. But the ‘fun’ did not stop there. Dad didn’t know we had to phone ahead to secure reservations for the flight home, so when he tried it was fully booked. They eventually found us some seats but told us we needed to pay a penalty for having too much weight; we had to carry a one hundredweight toolbox on board as hand luggage. Luckily we had left all the tyres at the circuit – even though we had ended up not even using them for the race – because we couldn’t be bothered to lug them all the way back to Tokyo.
In those days, we used Metzeler tyres because they were free and we couldn’t afford Michelins. They weren’t that bad, especially on road circuits. Everyone else in 1989 was running 17in Michelin rears on the Honda RC30, while I was running 18in Metzelers. It was all a bit ‘pre-war’, but I loved it. People thought I was mad, and they were a bit hit and miss. At some circuits, such as Thruxton and Mallory, the Metzelers were crap, but at others they were great. The previous year at Donington when I was going for my first F1 world title, there was no way the Metzelers were going to work, so I bought a Michelin, scrubbed the name off, stuck some Metzeler stickers on and came fifth to clinch the championship. Michelin were not too happy when they found out, of course; while Metzeler didn’t know what to think. They were too busy celebrating the win anyway. Then, again at Donington in 1989 the Metzelers were brilliant. Niall Mackenzie had returned from the Grand Prix circuit and thought he would clean up in all three races. He didn’t, but I did. From then on, after signing for Honda in 1990, I was on Michelins for the rest of my career, apart from one year on Dunlops in 1992 as a privateer, when we had to negotiate a special price.
There didn’t seem to be the same tyre sponsorship available in those days as there is for young riders today. Nowadays, the methods of selection are a bit more sophisticated, but the need to go to any lengths to get the right tyres on the bike is even more important. Tyre selection is perhaps the most crucial part of qualifying and practice. When I started out in racing there was not too much choice. Everyone pretty much ran on intermediate Michelin tyres – a bit like today’s cut slicks, which have grooves sliced into the rubber by a machine, but straight out of the mould. If it rained, there was a wet tyre, so there were only two choices. Even by 1995, the choice of tyre never seemed critical as they all seemed to work on the best bike I have ever ridden.
I wish it had been like that towards the end of my career. Now there are different compounds, different sizes and different shapes to take into account when trying to decide which tyre to use for a race. In 1996, when I was riding for Honda, finding the right rear tyre was an absolute nightmare. I guess it’s because the bikes are getting faster and more powerful, so there is less and less grip and more and more heat in the rear tyre. From that date onwards it was almost as though you would win the race if you could find the right tyre – as simple as that.
The size of the tyres when I started out was 18in. That size then dropped to 17in and now 16.5in tyres are sometimes used. When the 17in came out in 1985, it looked really good. Although it was an intermediate tyre, the sides almost looked as though they were slick, with no tread. Maybe it was just a psychological thing, but I loved it.
Everybody seemed to be using Michelins in those days, although a lot of racers and motocross riders have now switched to Dunlop. It was always pretty well accepted that Michelin produced a better tyre for superbikes and Grand Prix bikes while Dunlop made tyres more suited to the 250cc and 125cc series. But the balance has shifted because Dunlop now produce a very good superbike tyre. In the few races I competed in 2000, I noticed that Dunlop had made big strides during the winter.
But there have been a lot of changes recently. In the last dry races of my career, at Kyalami in South Africa in 2000, I rode on a 16.5in front and rear tyre for the first time in my career. It felt really good, although I went back to a 17in at the front for the second race because I was struggling to change direction a little bit. The smaller the wheel, the fatter they are, and because my shoulder was already injured for those races I found the steering really heavy. Although I was going really quick and set the new lap record, I kept losing the front because the 17in tyre at the front was a bit narrower and would not hold the track as well. I was given a few warnings when going over bumps, but I guess I ignored them and down I went.
For the rest of the year, all the riders on Michelins used 16.5in tyres at the front and rear. It’s strange because in my last six years of racing, I had tested 16.5in and 16in front wheels but never liked them. I always asked for them to be changed back straight away to 17in with a 5.75in rim at the back and 17in with a 3.5in rim at the front. The steering on the others always felt heavy and they didn’t give me any advantage. The only problem with the 17in tyres was that their grip would drop off very quickly towards the end of a race. But a 16.5in rear, while not providing the same grip at the start of a race, would be better towards the finish.
So deciding on the size of tyre was never really too much of an issue. Most of the debate centred around what was the best compound for the conditions and circuits, especially at the rear, where all the drive comes from. I would go so far as to say that finding the right rear is the most critical part of racing. More often than not I would find a front tyre I was happy with early on and then stick with it. But, particularly in 1997 and 1998, not being able to find the right rear tyres cost me a lot of races. When Davide Tardozzi became my team manager in 1998, we started to ride race distances on a Saturday to make sure that we found the tyres which would last the 25 laps and give good grip.
With so many different options in the choice of compound or profile – there might have been between eight to 15 choices available – it was easy to miss the best tyre during testing. It might have been tested and ruled out, for instance, during practice on a Friday, when the grip of the track was not as good. Come race day, when there were a couple more days’ worth of rubber on the track, it might have performed a lot better. And that choice was even harder if there was a sidecar meeting. After the sidecars had been on the track for two days, the choice we had made on a Friday might be completely useless by the Sunday because sidecars deposit a lot more rubber than bikes, and the more rubber on the surface the better the grip on most tracks. The hard work of 1999 paid off though, because seven times out of ten we chose the right tyre.
Michelin have always got a pretty good idea of what to use when we arrive at a meeting. The obvious starting point is to return to what was used the previous year. My tendency was always to go for as hard a tyre as possible at the outset, and try the softer ones later if necessary. As I carried a lot of corner speed, I wanted a tyre which would hold together well mid-corner when I was leaning over as far as possible. So my rear tyres always tended to be that bit harder than those of other riders. That wasn’t always the case, because Ducati had always got away with using a softer compound than Honda until 1995, but come 1997 we started using a harder compound because the engine had become so aggressive that it had started to destroy the softer compounds. So, around then, we started to lose an advantage over the Hondas. Softer tyres are not always ideal, though. If they get too hot they can grip too much and then the bike can chatter because it starts to grip-slip, grip-slip, grip-slip.
Even for Superpole, the one-lap shoot-out that decides grid positions, my qualifying tyres tended to be that little bit harder. But it has generally been accepted that Dunlop produce a better qualifying tyre than Michelin, and Troy Corser confirmed that with his move from Michelin to Dunlop when he rode for Aprilia in 2000. That didn’t bother me because Michelin produced better race tyres, which was far more important. Superpole was never my strong point, yet I still finished second in the Superpole standings for the season behind Troy in my final full year in 1999. Had I been fourth instead of fifth at Sugo, I would have won the competition – a competition I didn’t even know existed.
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