Wednesday 13 May 2015

Tyres, tyres and more tyres Pirelli Barcelona Test review

(Pirelli Motorsport Media)

The two day in season in Barcelona concluded on Wednesday. Over the course of the test the teams tested the entire 2015 P-Zero Soft compound range as well as the prototype compounds for the future.

Ferrari, Mercedes, Infiniti Red Bull Racing and Scuderia Toro Rosso carried out tyre testing for Pirelli with Spanish Grand Prix race winner Nico Rosberg setting the fastest lap time over the course of the test for the Mercedes AMG PETRONAS F1 Team using the Soft compound tyre.

On the opening day of the test the German set a time of 1m 24.347s completed using a set of the Pirelli Soft compound tyre. On Wednesday, the Lotus F1 Team’s Jolyon Palmer completed the fastest lap on a set of the Super Soft compound tyre. The 2014 GP2 champion set a fastest time of 1m 26.080s completing 87 laps.

During the two day test the weather conditions remained extremely warm and were very similar to conditions experienced by the teams over the course of the Spanish Grand Prix last weekend.

The longest run carried out on the Medium compound tyre was by Scuderia Toro Rosso’s Carlos Sainz with the Spaniard completing 23 laps on the second day of testing. Williams Martini Racing Team’s Felipe Massa completed 12 consecutive laps on the Hard compound tyre on the opening day of the test.

Nick Yelloly completed 12 laps on the opening day of the test using the Soft tyre while both the Lotus F1 Team’s Jolyon Palmer and McLaren Honda’s Jenson Button completed five laps on the Super Soft compound tyre.

Speaking about the test, Pirelli Motorsport Director Paul Hembery commented by saying:

We tried out a number of different solutions for the future, thanks to the four teams that were testing for us. With all the teams now knowing their cars and this track very well, a considerable number of kilometres were run, which obviously helped our data acquisition. The track had also evolved somewhat compared to the race, which resulted in slightly quicker lap times. Even though there are no specific tyre test days this year, the prototype information we have gained will be useful when it comes to developing our 2016 tyre range for next year.

© Ben Johnston 2015


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