"We brought a new profile, which is the profile we have now, at Valencia for the race. We brought the old tyre in two compounds and the new tyre in two compounds," Michelin's Nicolas Goubert explained in Argentina on Saturday. "People made a comparison and 90% chose the [new] big profile so we were certain it was a good direction for 2017."
But Goubert confirmed the rigidity of the 2017 tyre was then reduced following chattering issues. Results with this softer construction at the start-of-year Sepang and Phillip Island tests were "really good", with Rossi one of the few riders who still preferred the earlier version.
"From the beginning [Rossi] was not happy with the direction we took for 2017, but he was not the only one," Goubert said. "Iannone was not happy and Bautista sometimes said he would prefer the old one. We said to them: 'Sorry, you are only a couple of people, okay Valentino Rossi among them, but as everyone else seems to be happy we will continue'.
"That changed after the Qatar race, because we had a lot more comments from different people saying they were not that happy with the new tyres and we should think about doing something."
Michelin first had some doubts of their own during the final test in Qatar, two weeks before the race.
"At the Qatar test as you might remember we had quite a few crashes, too many crashes. Okay Qatar is a bit specific so we didn't change our mind, sometimes you have humidity there... it was not really clear. Then came the race and more people ["six or seven"] said the feeling with the front was not what they expected it to be. But again it was Qatar, difficult conditions for the race. So is it specific to Qatar or something we will see again?"
The end result was a decision to bring a fourth front tyre option to Argentina, featuring the original 2017 stiffer casing, while keeping the same profile.
"The main allocation here is the construction we had in Qatar, but we also decided to bring a tyre with the stronger construction, from Valencia 2016. Just to make sure we took the good decision and if the results show something else, we are ready as always to change our direction."
But the test tyre never appeared on track.
"Unfortunately the tyres were late because of a strike. It took me 72 hours to come here and it took some of our tyres a long time as well, and they were not available for Friday," Goubert said.
"The plan was then to try the tyre on Saturday, but the riders' Safety Commission intervened, deciding - with rain forecast and already having three different fronts and rears to evaluate - yet another tyre would be too much of a distraction.
"Looking at the weather forecast and time they have left, they took the decision not to use that tyre. It was a reasonable decision, especially when you look at what happened today. Because there was not a lot of time, bad conditions... we agreed," Goubert said.
"Without the strike we would have had test results on the Friday and we would more-or-less know by now if we are right, or if we have to change something... As it was, there were hardly any crashes and people were okay with the normal tyre allocation."
The Frenchman added that the plan was never to race the extra tyre, since it would only be offered in a soft compound and "nobody is going to go with the soft compound if it is fully dry."
Rossi, who was not in the Safety Commission meeting, admitted he would have liked to try the tyre to help further understand his front-end problems: "They said to me we cannot use. I think it can be interesting to try it, but we stay with the normal tyre."
It is now not clear when, or even if, the tyre will be seen again.
"Not likely to see it in Texas because Texas is even more demanding than here... we will see, depending on what happens in this race," Goubert said.
