F1 to continue using 2019 specification of Pirelli tires

While 70% of the votes were required to allow a regulatory change during the season, this threshold was not reached since only half of the teams – Ferrari, Alfa Romeo, Haas, Red Bull, and Toro Rosso – would have voted for such a tire modification.

After an outrageous start to the campaign dominated by Mercedes, several of its rivals have spoken out in favor of a return to the 2018 casings, which feature a 0,4mm thicker tread. The disgruntled explain that the switch to 2019 tires has only favored the German team, which has already been crushing the competition since 2014 and the advent of the current V6 turbo hybrids.

Requests for changes have intensified in recent weeks and transformed into an emergency meeting this Friday at Spielberg at the request of Nikolas Tombazis, head of single-seater series at the FIA. It must be said that the recent French Grand Prix, processional to say the least, plunged the sport a little further into an identity crisis which has lasted for several seasons now. 

In addition to the team bosses, several drivers were present at the meeting, including the multiple world champions Lewis Hamilton et Sebastian Vettel, representatives of teams with diametrically opposed opinions, as well as Romain Grosjean, director of the Grand Prix Drivers Association (GPDA).

If Mercedes hegemony can prove deadly for sporting interest this season, changing the rules of the game in the middle of the game would have been somewhat laughable. Despite the outcome of the meeting, not sure that the F1 comes away with honors in this affair.