Lewis Hamilton’s theory has been disproven ahead of the Canadian Grand Prix this weekend.
Pirelli chief Simone Berra has argued against Lewis Hamilton’s theory that the current crop of F1 tyres are ‘peaky’ after the Mercedes star labelled the modern generation of rubber as his ‘least favourite’.
Hamilton expressed his frustrations with F1’s current tyres after the Miami Grand Prix, citing their minor operating window as the biggest annoyance. As things stand, drivers have to work extremely hard, particularly during qualifying, to avoid overheating the rubber as when this happens, it is impossible to bring them back into the ideal temperature range.
“Honestly, it’s probably the most frustrating thing,” Hamilton complained. “You look back in the day when you had a much bigger working window to work with. Then you can just optimise the balance and then just have good grip throughout the whole lap. This is definitely my least favourite.”
In response to these claims, Berra hit back: “Every tyre has a peak at some point and the operating window is always just a definition. We take a certain percentage of grip loss to define the window. I think even in the past it was the same. But probably it was less critical because the level of detail that we have at the moment is quite significant.
“That’s why now everything is highlighted and important. In the past, 15 to 20 years ago, you had cars or drivers even divided by half a second or seven-tenths of a second so it was not so narrow. But the fight now is completely different, and even one-tenth of a second makes a great difference.”
