Monaco GP: Pirelli Thursday Practice Review
By Courtesy of Pirelli
May 27 2016
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Pirelli
Monaco GP Thursday Practice Review |
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The new P Zero
Purple ultrasoft tyre made its debut at the Monaco Grand Prix during free
practice, setting the fastest time of the day thanks to a benchmark of
1m14.607s from Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo in FP2. The Australian’s time was
four tenths of a second faster than last year’s pole and brought him
remarkably close to the all-time race lap record (1m14.439s) set by Michael
Schumacher in 2004 with Ferrari.
With the track evolving rapidly, as is always the case in Monte Carlo, grip
improved as both sessions went on despite several accidents that left debris
on track. The Purple ultrasoft times recorded were up to a second faster
than the Red supersoft times, with a trouble-free programme completed. All
the drivers were able to assess all three compounds nominated – soft,
supersoft and ultrasoft – with different fuel loads in the warm conditions
of the afternoon (peaking at 44 degrees track temperature) in order to
determine potential race strategies.
Paul Hembery, Pirelli motorsport director: “We’ve had some good
feedback from the ultrasoft tyre, which has delivered everything we wanted
from it so far: extra performance and the potential to have an effect on
strategy. From what we can see so far, we’d expect to get more than 15 laps
out of this tyre before it’s necessary to come in and change: the
interesting question will be whether or not this diverts any drivers away
from the one-stop strategy, which has been the winning choice at the Monaco
Grand Prix in four of the last six races. There will be a lot of data for
everyone to look at tonight, in order to draw the final conclusions about
strategy during free practice on Saturday morning – by which time, with the
unusual day’s break between sessions here, the track might have quite a
different feel to it.”
Minimum prescribed tyre pressures: 19.5 PSI front - 18 PSI rear
Pirelli fact of the day: The Monaco Grand Prix has been run for Formula One
cars since the championship was inaugurated with one notable exception, the
1952 race, which was for sports cars. On that occasion, Vittorio Marzotto
won in a Ferrari, having started from 11th on the grid and completed 100
laps. In 1996, Olivier Panis won a rain affected race from even further down
the grid: the Frenchman was 14th in qualifying. His victory is still the
last one for a Frenchman in Formula One.
Spotted in the paddock: Pastor Maldonado. The Venezuelan made a welcome
return to the F1 paddock, having lost his Renault seat to Kevin Magnussen at
the start of this year. But clearly, there are no hard feelings…
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FP1 –TIMES
1 Hamilton 1m15.537s UltraSoft - New
2 Rosberg 1m15.638s UltraSoft - New
3 Vettel 1m15.956s UltraSoft – New
FP2 – TIMES
1 Ricciardo 1m14.607s UltraSoft - Used
2 Hamilton 1m15.213s UltraSoft - New
3 Rosberg 1m15.506s UltraSoft – New
FP1– BEST TIME PER COMPOUND
Soft Sainz 1m17.130s
Supersoft Kvyat 1m16.426s
Ultrasoft Hamilton 1m15.537s
FP2 – BEST TIME PER COMPOUND
Soft Kvyat 1m16.529s
Supersoft Hamilton 1m15.489s
Ultrasoft Ricciardo 1m14.607s
LONGEST STINT OF THE DAY
Soft Perez 21 laps
Supersoft Haryanto 17
Ultrasoft Ricciardo 21
Tyre statistics of the day:
Soft Supersoft Ultrasoft
kms driven * 854 1999 2273
sets used overall ** 18 36 39
highest number of laps ** 31 31 34
* The above number gives the total amount of kilometres
driven in FP1 and FP2 today, all drivers combined.
** Per compound, all drivers combined.
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