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On its return to
Europe, the P Zero Yellow soft tyre (which has been nominated together with
the P Zero Silver hard tyre for the first time this season) set the fastest
time in the second free practice session in Barcelona: the home of the
Spanish Grand Prix.
Jenson Button set the fastest time during the second session this afternoon,
with a time of 1m23.399 on the soft tyre. As expected, temperatures remained
dry and warm for both the hour and a half sessions, allowing the drivers to
experience the sort of conditions that they are likely to encounter during
qualifying on Saturday. For the race, a risk of rain showers has been
initially forecast.
With Barcelona being one of the circuits that places heavy demands on the
tyres, the teams used the two free practice sessions to assess wear and
degradation rates on different fuel loads, and also to establish a base
set-up that will suit their likely strategies. With many teams having
introduced upgrades at the recent Mugello test, free practice in Barcelona
was also another opportunity to see how these worked in conjunction with the
2012-specification Pirelli tyres.
For the first time, there is an entire step in between the two compounds
that have been nominated by Pirelli for the race. With a lap time difference
of just over a second between the two compounds, strategy will be even more
important during the race, putting an emphasis on the data collected by the
teams during free practice today.
In the morning session, the teams concentrated exclusively on the P Zero
Silver hard before moving onto the P Zero Yellow soft tyre in the afternoon
with some further use of the hard compound. The fastest time in free
practice one was set by Ferrari driver Fernando Alonso with a benchmark of
1m24.754s.
Pirelli’s motorsport director Paul Hembery said: “It was a very
important session today for all the teams, as they aimed to gather as much
information as possible in order to prepare their race strategies, which are
going to have a big influence on the final outcome of the race. Barcelona is
well known for a notable degree of tyre wear thanks to long and fast corners
such as turn three, and although we still have plenty of data to analyse, it
seems that the frontrunners will be likely to adopt a three-stop strategy.
However, with a wider gap between the two nominated tyres than usual – both
in terms of compound and performance – we could see some quite different
strategies that are capable of springing a surprise. And of course if the
rain showers that some people are predicting for Sunday materialise, then
the race will take on an entirely new and unexpected complexion. With many
of the teams introducing new developments in Spain, it almost feels like we
are starting the season from scratch again.”
Tomorrow (Saturday) Paul Hembery will be taking part in a live online chat
from the Spanish Grand Prix at 6.00pm local time (+1 hour CET), together
with Pirelli test driver Jaime Alguersuari, who has been recently testing
Pirelli’s latest development tyres at Jerez in the south of Spain. To join
in and stream on your own website please visit:
http://streamingf1.pirelli.com/share/
To watch, please visit: https://www.facebook.com/Pirelli/app_234658916574732
PIRELLI NUMBERS OF THE DAY:
Sets used overall:
Hard 53
Soft 25
Intermediates 0
Wet 0
Highest number of laps per compound:
Hard 17
Soft 18
Intermediate 0
Wet 0
PIRELLI FACT OF THE DAY:
Last year, a four-stop strategy proved the key to success for Red Bull
driver Sebastian Vettel: the only race other than Turkey (which also
contains high-speed, high-energy corners) where this was the case. Pirelli
nominated the hard and soft tyres last year in Barcelona as well, but this
year’s compounds are softer across the board: the 2012 hard compound is
similar in character to last year’s medium. However, the teams have plenty
of experience of running the 2012 Pirelli tyres in Barcelona through
pre-season testing. The final test held in March was dominated by Lotus,
which went quickest on three out of the four days, using the P Zero Yellow
soft tyre. |
