Pirelli have confirmed the tyre selection for this weekend’s Spanish Grand Prix at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, as Lando Norris tries to continue the momentum garnered from winning in Monaco last time out.
The last two races have seen the softest Pirelli compounds in use, but this weekend the Italian manufacturer has opted to give the teams the hardest tyres in their range – the C1 as the hard, the C2 as the medium and the C3 acting as the soft.
Drivers will get two sets of the hard tyre (marked white), three sets of the medium tyre (marked yellow), and eight sets of the soft tyre (marked red), as well as access to the green intermediate tyre and the blue full wets, should they be required.
An extra set of softs is reserved for those who reach Q3 in Qualifying, while all drivers must use at least two different slick compounds during the race, providing the track is dry.
Pirelli’s weekend preview reads: “The three compounds have been revised since last year, especially the C2, making the performance gaps between them more equidistant. That could lead to the medium and soft being favoured for the race.
“The forces exerted on the tyres are medium to high, because of the many fast corners, such as Turn 3 and the final two, both of them righthanders. The corner of the car subjected to the greatest stress is the front left, as right hand turns are in the majority.”
In terms of strategy options for the event, it continues: “For years now a two-stop strategy has been pretty much a given at Montmelo, and last year’s race was no exception. All drivers, with the exception of Alex Albon starting from pit lane on the medium, lined up on the grid on the soft for the first stint.
“12 drivers used all three available compounds, leaving the hard for the final stint, while the top three finishers, winner Max Verstappen followed by Lando Norris and Lewis Hamilton, were on a second set of softs when they took the chequered flag.”
For more information about Pirelli’s F1 tyres, visit pirelli.com.
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