Pirelli already looking towards 2018

With its new products barely in service this year, with a clear increase in the dimensions of the tires installed on the new single-seaters meeting the technical regulations revised and corrected for 2017, Pirelli is already looking towards the next season in F1.

The Milanese brand was able to count on the 1761 laps (for a total of 9536 km) completed by the drivers and teams present at the two days of testing organized on the Sakhir track in Bahrain, in order to collect new data for the rest of the season.

But it is also with an eye towards 2018 that Pirelli approached these sessions, since the trans firmalpine took advantage of the first day to perform his laps with a view to developing tires for next season. Ferrari et Sebastian Vettel had been requisitioned for the occasion, despite running disrupted by problems on the SF70H.

“We are very happy with this session. Despite technical problems with the car, yesterday we were able to complete the program that we had set ourselves with Ferrari, comments Mario Isola, head of motor racing.

The circuit officials were very understanding in allowing us to extend the practice time limit by three hours. Sebastian Vettel completed 130 laps testing different potential solutions for next year.

Thanks to the stable weather conditions and the nature of the track, this Bahrain track is particularly suitable for this type of exercise, as we encountered no overheating problems.

We were thus able to collect a lot of data with different mixtures and we will now be able to analyze them from our Milan base. They will serve as a basis for the next development tests which will take place in Barcelona on May 16 and 17. »

Renault et Toro Rosso will be in action for this second session, Pirelli having taken advantage of the Bahrain weekend to unveil its test schedule for 2017.