Team reaction after Pirelli test day one

Sauber Ferrari

Today, for the first time in 19 years, Formula One cars were running on Pirelli tyres again. In warm ambient temperatures and perfect track conditions, Kamui Kobayashi covered 83 laps on the Yas Marina Circuit in Abu Dhabi and commented positively on next year’s F1 tyre supplier.

Kamui Kobayashi: “I think the tyres from Pirelli are well made. We tested how to work with these new tyres and how we need to further develop our car for them, learning in which way they are different to what we were used to running. The tyres were quite consistent. Only in the morning I struggled with tyre wear, but after we made some set-up changes this wasn’t an issue any longer. It was a very interesting test for us.”

James Key (Technical Director): “It was a very productive day. The baseline set-up was not too far away to begin with. We made a few changes and found a reasonable balance for the car fairly early. We ran our programme as planned with shorter runs to conserve tyres and consistency and a longer run in the end. We feel we learned a lot about the way the Pirelli tyres are behaving and responding to different set-up changes. We have to hand it to Pirelli, the tyres are already on a good level and we feel it was a very positive day.”

What comes next: Saturday is the second day of tyre testing and the final day of F1 testing until 1st February 2011. Kamui will be driving tomorrow morning, Sergio Pérez will take over driving duties after the lunch break.

Lotus Cosworth

Pirelli made its official return to Formula One today as the last two days of track action of the 2010 season began at the Yas Marina circuit in Abu Dhabi. Lotus Racing’s Heikki Kovalainen was in chassis T127-02 for the first day of the official two day tyre test and rolled out of the garage early on Friday morning on the first ever set of Pirelli tyres mounted in the modern F1 era. Over a busy day on track he completed 88 laps with a best time of 1.44.686.

Heikki Kovalainen: “It’s good to welcome Pirelli back into our sport and we had a good day on track, completing the whole programme and the balance of the car felt very comfortable all day. Honestly, I would like to drive the car again tomorrow but now we have a long break until testing starts again in a couple of months and I can’t wait to get back in the car next year.”

Mike Gascoyne, Lotus Racing Chief Technical Officer: “An interesting and very useful first day of testing with Pirelli. We had no mechanical issues on the car and managed to complete our full programme in 88 laps. The car was ballasted up to the 2011 weight limit for the day and we ran a series of fundamental tests within the parameters we could change with the tyres and in the afternoon we found some clear and useful setup directions for the engineers to work on. We set our quickest lap of the day at the end of the session on a pretty worn set and all of the data gives us very useful information that we will carry over to tomorrow when Jarno is back in the car for his first taste of the new Pirelli tyres.”

Renault F1

The Renault F1 Team began working with Pirelli tyres for the first time today as Robert Kubica got back behind the wheel of the R30 in Abu Dhabi.

Robert Kubica: “It’s always interesting to test new tyres and today was our first chance to try the new Pirellis and work with the new tyre engineers. We all know how important the tyres are for the behaviour of the car and so we concentrated on evaluating both compounds and understanding as much as we could about the tyre characteristics. Although we didn’t do a massive number of laps, we have still learned a few things and it feels good to have begun our relationship with Pirelli. Because we stopped early, we have saved some of the tyres for tomorrow, so it will be a busy day as we continue learning.”

Alan Permane, Chief Engineer: “We had our first taste of Pirelli tyres today and were able to run both the medium and soft compounds. The morning went well and Robert was reasonably happy with the car balance, although we made a few changes during the day to improve it. Our initial impression of the tyres has been positive: they were working well with good grip and no warm-up issues. Unfortunately we had to stop early because we had a mechanical issue with the car and we preferred to save the tyres for tomorrow when we’ve rectified the problem.”

Williams Cosworth

Tom McCullough, Senior Test Engineer: We completed more aero testing this morning and have collated some useful data. We then started our evaluations of the Pirelli tyres. We tested both the medium and soft compounds and have learnt a lot about their different characteristics. They performed well so, overall, we’ve had a very positive first day with Pirelli.

Rubens Barrichello: We’ve had a busy schedule today with plenty of work to do. This morning we evaluated aero set-up, before going for performance runs in the afternoon. This was our first session with the Pirelli tyres and I found it quite interesting. My initial impressions are positive and I look forward to working with them again tomorrow.

Williams will be back on track tomorrow, Saturday 20 November, with Rubens Barrichello completing the Pirelli tyre test.

Toro Rosso Ferrari

This was a significant day for Formula 1, as it was the first ever track test for all teams using tyres supplied by Pirelli, the Italian company which has a contract as the sole tyre supplier for the sport, for the next three seasons.

Each team was supplied with four sets of tyres for today – two Prime, which corresponds to a medium compound tyre on the Pirelli listing and two Option or Soft compound tyres. Jaime Alguersuari was at the wheel of the STR5 and spent the morning evaluating how the car behaved on the new tyres, as well as working on set-up to suit them. In the afternoon, work began on evaluating tyre performance and behaviour over long and short runs.

Jaime Alguersuari: “It was a useful experience for me to run on these new tyres. We did a good mileage, some runs on heavy fuel and some with less and it was interesting to see how the tyres behaved. It is too early to say more than that, because of course there will be more development to come from Pirelli before the next season starts.”

Chief Engineer, Laurent Mekies: “From the car side, we had a trouble free day. Track conditions are now very different to those over the race weekend, partly because of the two days of running during the young driver test. The day went well and we are now preparing for the second day of running with Pirelli, when Sebastien Buemi will take over at the wheel.”

Red Bull Renault

2010 World Champion Sebastian Vettel was back at the wheel of an RB6 today at the Yas Marina Circuit – just five days after taking his historic title at the same venue – for day one of the two-day Pirelli Test in Abu Dhabi.

With four sets of Pirelli tyres available for the first day, Red Bull Racing used the opportunity to gain as much information as possible about them and understand how they work with the car, ahead of the 2011 season.

Sebastian Vettel said: “It was all about the tyres today, as this was the first chance we have had to try them out and work with them to develop the car’s set-up for next year. I think the tyres behaved well, better than expected given the short amount of time Pirelli have had and they’ve done a good job. Pirelli are obviously in the middle of their development and what we used today is not what we will race with, but it was a good start. The circuit was in good condition and we had blue skies all day.

“It was great to be back in the car after an incredible week – I went to Salzburg on Monday morning for a TV show and press conference and then to the UK to say thanks to the team in Milton Keynes – that was quite emotional. It’s nice for me and the team to be able to enjoy our success, but 2011 started today and I was focusing on the tyres and getting to know them – I think we have learned quite a lot.”

Sebastian will be driving again tomorrow for the final day of the two-day test.

Ferrari

This was an important day for Formula 1 as it marked the return of Pirelli tyres to an official test on track. For Ferrari, it fell to Felipe Massa to be the first to try the new tyres. The Brazilian completed a total of 94 laps, the quickest in a time of 1.40.170.

Felipe Massa: "It was a positive start to begin to understand the behaviour of the Pirelli tyres. I felt at ease right from the start and there were no unpleasant surprises. We tried two different types and acquired a lot of data which will be useful for the Italian company to develop the tyres still further for the start of the 2011 season: on the hards, there were some difficulties over a long run while the softs worked well both on the very first lap and also after they had done a larger number of laps."

Stefano Domenicali: "I wish to take this opportunity to welcome back Pirelli to Formula 1. It is nice to see two symbols of Italian excellence together on track. I am sure that Pirelli will make a very important contribution to our sport in terms of professionalism and technical research."

Testing at this track continues tomorrow, when Fernando Alonso will be on track for the Scuderia.

HRT F1 Cosworth

The Pirelli tyres were tried out for the first time today at the tests in the Yas Marina Circuit in Abu Dhabi. It was just after 9 o´clock in the morning when Pastor Maldonado drove the Hispania Racing car out of the box with the new Pirelli tyres on for the first time. The Italian tyre supplier company returns to Formula 1 after a 19-year absence. Hispania Racing used the day to become familiar with the new medium and soft compound slicks.

Pastor Maldonado did many short runs so the Spanish team could try out different adjustments on the car and see how the new tyres responded, in order to get ready for the 2011 season. The Venezuelan drove a total of 83 laps (460.982 km), clocking a best time of 1.45.728. Tomorrow he will be back in the car with Hispania Racing to complete the second and final day of the Pirelli test in Abu Dhabi. Hispania Racing wants to welcome Pirelli back into Formula 1.

Dr. Colin Kolles, Team Principal: “With an air temperature of around 30 degrees and a track of 44, today’s conditions were ideal for testing the new Pirelli tyres for the first time. We have worked very hard and we were one of the teams who did a big number of laps. The target of the testing program today was to get as much data about the new tyres as possible, and we fulfilled it completely. Firstly, Pastor Maldonado had to get used to the new tyres, which are also new to us. After his settling in period, he felt more comfortable and could give us more information about the new tyres so that we could learn about them and keep on improving.”

Pastor Maldonado: “I enjoyed being back in the HRT F110 and get more experience in a Formula 1 car. We fulfilled our complete testing program in order to get as much data as possible from the new Pirelli tyres. I have now driven with both tyre suppliers, Bridgestone and Pirelli, and what I learnt out of it was that they are very different in their characteristics. Now we are going to analyze today’s data and get ready to keep on learning about the tyres at the last day of testing tomorrow.”

Mercedes GP

Preparations for the 2011 season with new Formula One tyre supplier Pirelli got underway at the Yas Marina Circuit in Abu Dhabi today with Nico Rosberg as the first of the MERCEDES GP PETRONAS drivers to evaluate the new tyres.

Nico’s programme for today was to complete an initial performance evaluation to various set-up parameters with the two tyre compounds provided by Pirelli, the medium and soft, which was successfully completed over 81 laps.

Michael Schumacher will drive tomorrow for the second and final day of the test.

Nico Rosberg: "As a team, and particularly the engineers, we did a really good job to be well prepared for this week’s Pirelli test with the work back at the factory and the support here at the track proving invaluable. That really helps once you get the tyres on and we were able to focus precisely on the set-up direction and have found various improvements. It’s a good start however there is obviously still some way to go before we get the best out of the tyres."

Ross Brawn: "Today has been very important for the team to start building our relationship with Pirelli. Whilst a lot of details remain to be understood, we feel that we have gained an initial understanding of the operational requirements of the two compounds that we have and have highlighted some important areas for investigation and improvement. We have been lucky to have been able to get exposure to the Pirelli tyres at a track with which we are now very familiar and in conditions that we will not experience again until the final test of the season in Bahrain. Michael watched today’s proceedings with great interest and is looking forward to experiencing the tyres for himself tomorrow."

McLaren Mercedes

First test for the team of the new-for-2011 Pirelli rubber. First impressions of the tyre were positive, with basic balance and performance similar to that of the Bridgestone.

The day was mostly spent gathering comparative tyre data, but the team also managed to put some miles on a number of proposed components for next season. "The tyres seem to be working well and not too different from Bridgestone, so a good start," said Gary Paffett, who has tested the 2010 McLaren with both Pirelli and Bridgestone tyres this week.

Tomorrow: Oliver Turvey (am) / Gary Paffett (pm)

Virgin Racing Cosworth

No sooner has the 2010 season reached it conclusion than the teams were back on track today with the first preparations for 2011. After a one day break following this week’s Young Driver Test, running resumed at the Yas Marina Circuit in Abu Dhabi today with the first of two days of testing with new tyre supplier Pirelli.

Timo Glock was in the Virgin Racing VR-01:04 to conduct a programme of tyre evaluations and setup work in order to gauge the performance and behaviour of the Pirelli rubber. In common with the other teams testing in Abu Dhabi, Virgin Racing will work with the eight sets of tyres available to them during the two days, comprising the medium and soft compounds.

Timo Glock: “It was good to be back in the car today to begin work on the 2011 programme. As our new tyre supplier it was good to start the relationship with Pirelli’s engineers and take a good look at the tyres to understand their characteristics. We did a lot of laps and worked though quite a detailed programme, so we have ended the day with a good feel for how the car was behaving with the tyres. We have some more work to do tomorrow and this will leave us in a good position over the winter until testing starts again early next year.”

John Booth, Team Principal: “We very much enjoyed the first day of our new working relationship with Pirelli and thanks to a very straightforward day with the car we were able to complete our full programme, running various stint lengths and fuel loads with both the medium and soft compound tyres. It is obviously very early days but we were able to get a good feel for the behaviour of the tyres and the results were positive both in terms of laptime and car balance. We were also able to continue running a number of test items for next year’s car with very satisfactory results.”

NB : No press release today from Force India