Pirelli respond to driver criticism: "Focus was on durability"

Pirelli had to make some major changes to the tyres for this season in order to adapt to the improved aerodynamics. According to Mario Isola, the new tyres are four-tenths of a second slower as a result.

Tyre manufacturer Pirelli has a thankless task in Formula 1. Since 2011, the company have been the sole supplier of the tyres and since then they have to deal with constant criticism. After all, the fans want tyres that wear out quickly to create exciting races, while the drivers want tyres that are extremely solid, fast and consistent.

During last year's test drives, the new tyres were criticised by the drivers. The rubbers did not improve performance. "That is a normal reaction. When drivers test new parts they always hope for an improvement in performance. In this case, however, the focus was only on durability, which was also agreed with the teams," Mario Isola told Auto, Motor und Sport.

No more records in 2021?

Because the new regulations have been postponed for a year, but in the meantime, teams can work on their aerodynamics, Pirelli has decided to make the tyres a lot more robust. And that has an impact on performance. "Our simulations predict a loss of time of four tenths to half a second, depending on the circuit. We can only react to this with the set-up. As teams become familiar with the tyres, the difference will not be so big anymore," predicts Isola.

Pirelli will also continue with the improvised rules of 2020. This means that for each race weekend teams will get two sets of the hard tyre, three of the medium compound and eight soft tyres. A division has also been made at which tracks harder tyres will be used and at which tracks soft. In two unknown cases, Pirelli has however made an aggressive choice: "In Azerbaijan and Brazil, we went a step softer than the 2019 races," Mario Isola concludes.