Heading into Free Practice 3 in Mexico, all 10 teams have the same number of hard, medium, and soft tire sets available. However, as reported by former strategist turned broadcaster Bernie Collins, Mercedes adopted a different strategy in FP3 with their tire choices.
During the live coverage of FP3 on Sky Sports F1, Collins, who was in the pitlane, reported that she believes Mercedes is going to use only four sets of soft tires in qualifying to save two sets of fresh medium tires (by not using the mediums in FP3) for the Grand Prix on Sunday.
After a quick debrief in the garage both drivers head out on new sets of Softs with 15 minutes of FP3 remaining pic.twitter.com/OU9Ubd27nZ
— Mercedes-AMG PETRONAS F1 Team (@MercedesAMGF1) October 26, 2024
In contrast, she predicted that other teams could opt to use one set of mediums and one set of softs in FP3 to have one extra set of softs available for their drivers. While this could be a disadvantage for Lewis Hamilton and George Russell in qualifying, they could benefit in the race on Sunday.
“Everyone has two sets of medium tires left. The teams in this session could be split. Some will run the medium tyre and have one medium for the race, but five softs for qualifying. Or some, like Mercedes, will run two softs in this session, so will only have four softs for qualifying but two mediums for the race,” Collins reported.
This strategy could turn out to be a masterstroke for Mercedes for Sunday’s race, however, that will depend on whether they can achieve the desired grid position in qualifying with one less set of soft tires.
Most of the time the teams save five sets of soft tires for qualifying. Because while they all try to get through Q1 on a single tire-set, they do prefer the luxury of having two sets available each for Q2 and Q3. But in this case, if Mercedes finds itself on the verge of dropping out of Q2 on a single set of soft tires, they will need to use an extra set, which will then leave them with only one set for the final part of qualifying.
However, Mercedes do need to resort to such strategies because they are not on par with the race pace of the Ferraris, the McLarens, and the Red Bulls, so having two sets of medium tires for the race will give them more room to play with in terms of race strategy.
