Pirelli promises to fix tyre issues

Italian tyre manufacturer not to rush to make any changes

Pirelli, the lone tyre manufacturer and supplier to the F1 World Championship, concluded after an investigation that tyre failures during last weekend’s British Grand Prix were solely due to the “unusually long stints”.

The Italian tyre manufacturer also admitted that the high-downforce loadings produced by the 2020 cars represent the “biggest forces ever seen on tyres” in F1 history, thereby resulting in at least five cars losing out over the weekend.

Lewis Hamilton, Valtteri Bottas and Carlos Sainz suffered front left failures in the closing laps of the race, with only winner Hamilton making it home without losing out on a position at the second Formula 1 triple-header of the season at Silverstone, last weekend.

For Hamilton, it was the 87th win of his Formula 1 career and his seventh in the British Grand Prix. It was also the 100th occasion on which he has started from the front row in a Mercedes-AMG Petronas F1 car.

Pirelli’s investigation indicated that the unexpectedly long second stints triggered by the safety car that came out when Daniil Kvyat crashed — co-incidentally because of a right rear puncture — led to the late failures.

Despite the events of last weekend, Pirelli has no plans to alter things this weekend.

“Pirelli will stick with its original plan to go one step softer for this weekend’s 70th Anniversary GP at Silverstone, with the C2, C3 and C4 in use, without the hardest C1 compound,” the statement said.