{"id":38270,"date":"2025-08-01T01:53:10","date_gmt":"2025-08-01T01:53:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/38270\/"},"modified":"2025-08-01T01:53:10","modified_gmt":"2025-08-01T01:53:10","slug":"fernando-alonso-has-made-this-bold-proposal-to-solve-f1s-wet-weather-woes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/38270\/","title":{"rendered":"Fernando Alonso has made this bold proposal to solve F1’s wet weather woes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Wet-weather conditions at the start of the 2025 Belgian Grand Prix saw Formula 1 race organizers delay the event for 80 minutes, at which point much of the water had dried.<\/p>\n

While many fans and some drivers have criticized Formula 1 and the FIA for playing it too safe under wet conditions, it\u2019s Aston Martin\u2019s Fernando Alonso who has a solution for the problem: Better tarmac.<\/p>\n

Fernando Alonso\u2019s tarmac solution to the wet-weather problem<\/p>\n

Additional reporting by Thomas Maher<\/p>\n

A heavy rain shower at the start of the 2025 Belgian Grand Prix left drivers complaining about the lack of visibility during the event\u2019s initial formation lap, with that issue ultimately leading to an 80-minute delay before the event got underway.<\/p>\n

The field paced behind the safety car on intermediate tyres for five laps before proper green-flag conditions kicked off the start of the race, but by lap 12, drivers were pitting for slicks \u2014 making many fans and pundits wonder if the FIA and Formula 1 weren\u2019t too cautious in delaying the event.<\/p>\n

Many also wondered why a start on Pirelli\u2019s wet tyres was not an option, but that again comes down to visibility.<\/p>\n

The wet tyres are marvels of engineering that can displace 85 liters of water per second per tyre \u2014 but all that water ends up in the air in the form of spray, reducing visibility and making conditions more dangerous.<\/p>\n

More on Formula 1 and wet racing:<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udc49 FIA facing \u2018impossible job\u2019 as drivers put in \u2018awkward position\u2019 over wet starts<\/a><\/p>\n

\ud83d\udc49\u00a0Martin Brundle demands internal FIA answers amid wet-weather F1 fear<\/a><\/p>\n

But ahead of the 2025 Hungarian Grand Prix, Fernando Alonso told media, including PlanetF1.com, that he believes there\u2019s a better way to go racing when the track is wet.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the since 2017, with that set of regulations and the wide tyres, the visibility is worse,\u201d Alonso began. \u201cBut it\u2019s a really difficult topic.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe all want to race, but if you are alone, you can\u2019t race. If you are in a group of cars, you cannot see anything, and we had unfortunately too many bad examples, especially in Spa, with poor visibility and very big accidents.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe all want to be brave. We all want to be racing, and spectators at home as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut then when an accident happens, we remember \u2014 there is nothing really wrong to wait another half an hours, you know, this is is the way it is.\u201d<\/p>\n

If the wide tyres are causing issues, then perhaps reverting to a skinnier tread could do the trick. But Alonso actually argues that a different style of tarmac could dramatically transform wet-weather racing.<\/p>\n

\u201cProbably some of the asphalt in the circuits, they are a little bit different than what they\u2019ve been in the past,\u201d Alonso said. \u201cBecause we raced with a lot of water in Sepang [Malaysia], in different circuits, and it was always okay.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd now this new generation of asphalt, which is very black and very grippy in dry conditions, is like a mirror in wet conditions. Visibility is not nice.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I don\u2019t know what we can do there, or what the tyres can do in a very rough tarmac.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd even some of the highways, I have said many times that the highways, there are some that they have zero spray. So if we implement that tarmac in all the circuits as a normal rule, we will have zero spray.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen it will be a huge degradation, probably, in dry conditions \u2013 I don\u2019t know. But then we can work from that and have a starting point.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I\u2019m just a driver.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are some significant barriers to the implementation of a rain-friendly tarmac at all the circuits on the Formula 1 calendar. Alonso points out the potential tyre degradation issues, which would certainly throw Pirelli for a loop.<\/p>\n

But there are also major costs associated with repaving a race track. Many circuits would prefer to avoid a repave until absolutely necessary. And, further, there are no guarantees that a change in tarmac would completely reduce the massive amounts of spray from the wet-weather tyres.<\/p>\n

Yet just because that kind of innovation is difficult does not mean it shouldn\u2019t be done, argued Carlos Sainz ahead of the Hungarian Grand Prix.<\/p>\n

\u201cI always thought Formula 1 should, if possible, innovate and try something different,\u201d he told media, including PlanetF1.com.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think there are certain kind of tarmacs that if you would put them on a straight line there would be no spray, and they exist, but circuits don\u2019t have them. Most circuits don\u2019t have it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sainz also noted that \u201cmaybe we should have done a better job in communicating\u201d why the FIA took a conservative approach to the delay \u2014 which certainly could have gone a long way in reducing the frustration associated with the delay.<\/p>\n

Read next:\u00a0Six title winners and one-win wonders to gain maiden glory at the Hungarian GP<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Wet-weather conditions at the start of the 2025 Belgian Grand Prix saw Formula 1 race organizers delay the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":38271,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[441],"tags":[585,49,48,578,576,577,1613,27858,44,82],"class_list":["post-38270","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-formula-1","tag-aston-martin","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-f1","tag-formula-1","tag-formula1","tag-home-page","tag-hungarian-grand-prix","tag-news","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38270","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38270"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38270\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38271"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}