What Was the Point of the Formula 1 Pre-Season Pirelli Tyre Test in Bahrain?

By
at Internationaled.org

Published: December 21, 2013

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The 2013 Formula One season was plagued by controversy over Pirelli and the tyres it supplied. In an attempt to head off similar problems in 2014, the FIA authorized a tyre test in Bahrain from December 17-19.

Now that the test, where 2014 tyres were used on 2013 cars, has finished, one question remains to be answered: What was the point?

As a refresher for those who tuned out once Sebastian Vettel turned the championship into a game of follow-the-leader, there were multiple high-speed blowouts at the British Grand Prix, a secret testing session with the Mercedes team and ongoing complaints about how quickly the tyres degraded.

Pirelli had planned to run its 2014 tyres during free practice at the season-ending Brazilian Grand Prix in November. This would have provided comparative data: the same cars and drivers, at the same track, running two different sets of tyres. Unfortunately, rain scuppered those plans, hence the necessity of the Bahrain test.

However, only four teams showed up in Sakhir last week, bringing just three drivers with 2013 race experience.



Not exactly ideal. If Pirelli is going to do any comparative analysis, it will be with data that is eight months old, from the 2013 Bahrain Grand Prix (unless Pirelli also brought 2013 tyres to the test).

When asked to comment for this article, Pirelli's Head of F1 Communications, Alexandra Schieren, told Bleacher Report via email, "This is a private Pirelli tyre test...the test is not open to the media or public, and we are not going to issue any media information from the test."

All that changed on the final day of the test, though, when Nico Rosberg tweeted that he had suffered a tyre blowout at 320 kph on the pit straight. The tweet was quickly deleted but not before it was widely shared. Grandprix247.com posted this screen capture:



Pirelli quickly issued a statement&n...
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Formula 1

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