Choosing Tires for Endurance Sim Racing

While participating in an endurance race, your tire choice is crucial to give you a chance at winning. For this you must consider a few key factors at which we will take a closer look in the following.

Your decision should be based on extensive testing before the race begins. Tire choice heavily depends on track temperature and weather conditions. For a dry race, it's important to set up a practice session that mirrors the forecasted conditions, such as temperature and grip level. During this session, you should complete several race stints to gather data for your tire strategy. Fanatec Wheel Bases deliver lightning-fast, unfiltered feedback directly to your hands, empowering you to create the best race strategy possible.

Different sims often feature various tire compounds. For example, in Le Mans Ultimate, you can choose between SOFT, MEDIUM, and HARD tires. In general, the different compounds exhibit the following characteristics:

Additionally, tire grip loss is mainly dependent on two factors:

Each compound has an ideal operating temperature. During the stint, you will see how the tire temperature and overall degradation develop, depending on the track conditions. If we take the SOFT tire as an example here, its optimal temperature lies around 76°C on average.

Like we established before, we expect a dry race, so the track temperature is going to be quite high. Remember, naturally, a SOFT tire has the most grip, so one might be quick to assume this is the fastest compound for the race stint. However, in combination with high track temperatures, this will lead to tire temperatures exceeding the optimal temperature range, making your car unstable and slippery. Even though you might get away with high tire temperatures for a few laps, you will experience a significant grip loss over the course of a whole stint, leading to slow lap times and not maximizing your pace relative to the stint length.

With these principles in mind, you should test the other tire compounds, looking to keep tire temperature as close as possible to the compound's optimal temperature range and minimizing degradation during the full stint. After a bit of testing, you will quickly find out which compound fits your track conditions.

In long endurance races (12-24 hours), track conditions can change significantly throughout the event. For instance, driving at night lowers the track temperature, which can make SOFT tires a more viable option. In such conditions, MEDIUM and especially HARD tires may not reach their optimal temperature range, resulting in less grip. However, if the lap time loss is minimal, you might consider switching to a different compound to double or even triple stint your tires.

When you head to the pits after your stint, you’ll refuel the car but not change tires. This can save time during a pit stop. However, the trade-off is that while you’re saving time in the pit, you’ll be driving a more durable but generally slower tire compound on track. This strategy is worth considering. Ultimately, it’s about being the fastest over the entire race, not just momentarily on track.

Weather can also throw unexpected challenges your way. Imagine it starts raining during the race. At first, light rain might still make slick tires the fastest choice, but as the track becomes wetter, you’ll need to be cautious. If you can barely keep the car on the racing line, it’s probably safer to pit for WET tires early, even if it doesn’t align with your original strategy.

WET tires have treads that provide much better grip in wet conditions than slicks. However, race pace will still be slower in the wet than in the dry. The real challenge is finding the right crossover point to switch tires in these mixed conditions. Pit too early from dry to wet, and your WET tires could overheat if the track isn’t damp enough yet. Pit too late, and your lap times will suffer or you may crash, as driving slick tires in the rain is risky.

In the end, this comes down to practice, gathering data for various scenarios, and keeping a cool head amidst the dynamic challenges a race can present!