Pirelli F1 found, like all teams, that the new track surface at the Interlagos circuit was very fast.
Mario Isola, the Italian manufacturer's competition manager, saw the times of past years shattered during the Freestyles. And McLaren even fell under one minute and nine seconds during Sprint qualifying.
“We expected these lap times because, as usual, we measured the roughness of the circuit. It is much smoother compared to last year, but the grip level is still in line with that of last year, not very high, but more or less the same, so we expected similar lap times, as well as a significant evolution of the track.
“I've heard some comments about the bumps, but honestly, it's not a detail that we take into account in our measurements. I expect, as I said, a significant evolution of the track and “maybe some problems if it rains. It looks like we have a chance of rain on Saturday afternoon and Sunday during the race and this new bitumen can generally create a slippery surface when wet.”
Let's go back to Mexico last weekend and the tire test that took place during Free 2. What conclusions were drawn from Pirelli's side?
“It's never easy to do a tire test in the middle of a race weekend, and I have to thank all the teams for their availability. We did the test. It was positive. We got a lot We have now defined a new trio of (softer) tires C4, C5 and C6 for next year.
“Thanks to this useful test for validating new compounds, we reinforce what we are working on in private trials. Obviously, we cannot test a different construction during this type of test. I was a little worried when I saw the red flag, obviously, because we didn't have much margin to execute the whole plan, but we did. We shortened the long runs by a few laps to make sure everyone could complete the test, and. It worked pretty well.”
Isola released the information: the C6. There will certainly be a very soft compound, the C6, in 2025. Where will we see this tire other than in Monaco?
“That's a good question. I would like to wait for the post-season testing in Abu Dhabi. We are still missing some data on the C6.”
“It is important to emphasize that we have to approve the compound if we want to use it, but we are not obliged to use it. So I prefer to have the flexibility of having a C6 in the range which is mainly intended for circuits urban.”
“I can imagine, for example, Las Vegas, just to give you a name that is not Monaco, because otherwise everyone only mentions Monaco. We have more and more street circuits in the calendar. Having the flexibility of having a C6 could be useful.”
“And we don't have to select, say, three compounds in a row. So if we realize that, for example, C6 might be good on some tracks, but close to C5, we can also decide to name the C3s, C4 and C6 and skipping a level, so that gives us a little more flexibility.”
“We will discuss with the teams and with the FIA an allocation project for next year, as we always do. And I am happy to have this flexibility, honestly.
