Motor Racing: Bridgestone's tyre change

The Japanese tyre manufacturers, Bridgestone, are to develop new Formula One tyres in line with rule changes that caused Goodyear to announce their withdrawal from the sport.

"We are determined to develop new tyres based on new rules adding the data we collected this season, and continue to supply competitive tyres for Formula One racing for the future," their vice-president, Tada-kazu Harada, said.

Bridgestone returned to racing this season after more than two decades and supplied Arrows-Yamaha, Prost-Mugen- Honda, Minardi-Hart and Stewart-Ford.

Goodyear took Formula One by surprise on Wednesday by announcing they are to quit at the end of next year because of new rules forcing the use of tyres with grooved treads that would need costly changes.

They supplied tyres for nine teams, including Williams-Renault, McLaren, Ferrari, Jordan Peugeot, Tyrrell-Ford, Benetton-Renault and Sauber-Petronas.