Head of F1 and Car Racing at Formula 1’s sole tyre supplier, Mario Isola, admitted that he welcomes the additional Formula 1 pre-season test in 2022, as the sport is ready for a radically changed era next season with new cars that aim to create more exciting racing by reducing the amount of dirty air created by the advanced aerodynamics showcased on current cars.
Pirelli will also have a significant contribution by introducing the new 18-inch tyres and despite several testing sessions scheduled during this season to gather important data on the new compounds, teams will have just six to eight days of testing with the tyres fitted to the next generation cars ahead of the first race of the 2022 Formula 1 season:
This is increased from the three days afforded this season in Bahrain. Mario Isola explained:
“That is good because obviously with the new car, it’s not just about understanding the tyres. They will be setting up a car that is not something similar to what they have now, with cars that they know very well. There is always a bit of unpredictable stuff that happens during a test. Probably if I look back a few years, like what happened in the past when we had the bigger change in the technical side like in 2017, they dedicate the first session to the car. Usually, they use a standard compound or a couple of compounds in the middle of the range, depending on the circuit in order to set up in the car to understand the car, to test new parts. The second session is more dedicated to tyres, understanding of the tyres, going through all the range of compounds. Next year, we will have a complete new range of compounds so they also need to dedicate some time to understand the new compounds because it was not possible to just upgrade the current family of compounds because the target is really challenging, so we had to design a new family of compounds.” – he added.
Unlike free practice sessions, pre-season testing will only see 10 cars on track at any time with each team’s drivers sharing driving duties in one car.
The Head of F1 and Car Racing warned this will impact the data collection across the tests.
“Let’s say the baseline was necessary, that is in the middle of the range and from the C3, we’d arrive also C2, C1 on one side and C4, C5 for the soft side, but they are all new. So the teams need some time to test their short runs, long runs, and it takes time. Don’t forget that during the pre-season testing, they have only one car, not two cars with two drivers, so they have half of the amount of information compared to a normal race weekend.” – Mario Isola concluded.
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