Pre-season test 1

HOW TO TELL THE FIVE COMPOUNDS APART IN TESTING

MARIO ISOLA - HEAD OF F1 AND CAR RACING

“We had good weather conditions and a low number of red flags, which enabled plenty of running, thanks also to an impressive level of reliability from all the cars. The fastest times were considerably faster than the equivalent first test last year, which shows the natural evolution of the cars, as the tyres are the same this year. This means there is one less unknown quantity for the teams to deal with as they dial themselves into their new cars. Everything went as expected from our side apart from some abrasion in the cool conditions of the morning, which is normal under those circumstances. As always, it is hard to read a lot into the comparative lap times: every team is testing with different car specifications, fuel loads, set-ups and tyre compounds. The characteristics of Barcelona suit the harder end of the P Zero range, also because of the increased roughness now due to the natural ageing of the relatively new asphalt. As a result, there was not that much running with the softest compounds. Because there are fewer test days compared to last year, we’ve also seen longer runs with more intense programmes than previous seasons, which additionally influenced tyre choice.”