World Rally Championship crews are set to have a revised tyre at their disposal for next week’s Acropolis Rally Greece, which marks the start of seven consecutive gravel rallies.
After receiving criticism regarding the durability of its hard compound gravel tyre following last month’s Rally Portugal, Hankook has swiftly made revisions to its tyre with the updated product set to make its debut in Greece next week.
Improving the tyre’s durability has emerged as a key area which the Korean firm has focused on with its latest specification of the Dynapro hard compound gravel tyres.
Despite facing a short validation period, WRC teams have been running the updated tyre during pre-event tests last week. This is the second updated tyre Hankook has introduced this season after debuting a new soft compound gravel tyre ahead of this year’s Safari Rally Kenya in March.
Hankook has now shed more light on the details changed to the hard tyre in a bid to provide a product that will cope better at upcoming hot rough gravel rallies, beginning with Greece, next week.
“It’s actually a very small tuning from Hankook’s Portugal specifications, so it’s more like an evolution rather than a new tyre,” said Hankook’s WRC representative Steven Cho.
Hankook tyres
Photo by: Toyota Racing
“The compound, construction and profile are unchanged. We’ve made a small adjustment to the tread thickness, and despite the change being relatively modest, we’ve seen a meaningful improvement in overall performance and consistency.”
Greece’s hot and rough gravel stages will prove to be an ideal test for the new rubber that will likely be a key talking point.
Hyundai has earmarked the return to gravel as an opportunity to take the fight to the championship’s dominant force Toyota and the South Korean manufacturer has tasted victory in Greece in three of the last four WRC visits.
“We should have a good start position if the weather is with us that weekend,” 2024 Acropolis winner Thierry Neuville told Autosport ahead of last week’s pre-event test.
“It is generally a rally where Hyundai has been successful in the past. Rough gravel rallies with lots of grip is where we are strong. There are still some unknowns as we have new tyres that Hankook are going to bring, so there are a couple of question marks.”
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– The Autosport.com Team
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