Originally Posted by
Mirek
This is all a principal question and a very interesting one because it's one which will always divide people. Generally there are two major directions which one can take.
The first one is to make all condition for the drivers (crews) as even as possible by extreme restriction of the rules. By this you can achieve maximum weight of the crew skills in the overall result. In general it means to follow athletic sports and try to turn motorsport into human-only performance and by that also limit the vehicle to a simple tool - like shoes, skates, balls or hockey sticks. This is currect WRC.
The second option is to go back to the essence of motorsport which didn't start as a competition of drivers (crews) but as a competition of machines. It's obvious that the more freedom of rules you give the higher is the weight of the machine performance in the overall result. This is where crazy engineering ideas appear and win races - something lost in rallying of the 80'. I think that most technical people would prefer more freedom of rules, not only about tyres but also about engines, suspension, you name it. The excitement coming from the technical development used to be part of the game but it's long gone. To be honest I am not interested in today's searching for which team used 0,5° larger castor or a slightly more angled wing leading edge on otherwise completely same machines.
Now back to the tyres. You present something as a pure risk but in the same time it's also a potentional advantage. You can loose but just like that you can win, and win a lot. And it's not in any way a lottery. The manufacturers know how to measure performance and how to select their suppliers. In the end they can throw whatever shit on the tyre manufacturers but the selection is their choice. Having a single supplier is easy for everyone but it removes part of the competition which some other people would like to see.