Pirelli says drivers should be given maximum stint lengths for its tyres

2015 Belgian Grand Prix

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Pirelli has issued a blunt statement in response to Sebastian Vettel’s crash in today’s Belgian Grand Prix.

F1’s official tyre manufacturer said drivers should have been given a maximum number of laps they were allowed to run on its tyres during today’s race, as it requested at the end of 2013.

“In November 2013, Pirelli requested that there should be rules to govern the maximum number of laps that can be driven on the same set of tyres, among other parameters to do with correct tyre usage,” said the statement. “This request was not accepted.”

“The proposal put forward a maximum distance equivalent to 50% of the grand prix distance for the prime tyre and 30% for the option. These conditions, if applied today at Spa, would have limited the maximum number of laps on the medium compound to 22.”

Vettel’s medium compound tyre failed 27 laps into his stint.

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    Keith Collantine
    Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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    111 comments on “Pirelli says drivers should be given maximum stint lengths for its tyres”

    1. Seems like at one time we had Pirelli tires that would go off and lose a great deal of grip before they exploded.

      1. Another reason it may actually be better to have tires that eventually drop off in performance…

    2. One thing which has surprised me is the speed of Pirelli’s response. After Rosberg’s tyre failure, they investigated the cevidence overnight. Yet in this instance Hembury was blaming tyre wear almost instantly, within half an hour or so of the race end. Surely a similar investigation would be required before they could state definitively why they think it failed? Particularly given that a number of teams seem to have expressed scepticism about Pirelli’s explanation.

      1. I agree, it doesn’t inspire confidence when they make such statements without carrying out a detailed investigation first.

      2. Defensive behavior is one signifier of guilt.

        1. Defensive behaviour is also one signifier of innocence. If I’m accused of something I didn’t do I’m going to be bloody defensive about it.

      3. It does suggest they may have had concerns with tire wear prior to the race. Perhaps Rosberg’s crash made them recheck all parameters.

        1. It doesn’t matter. They didn’t have time to check Vettel’s tyre. How can you trust the answer? It doesn’t even make sense as there was no performance drop to suggest end of tyre life. I think the cliff means there is around 30% of the rubber left? He hasn’t hit the cliff. How did the end of tyre life come before the cliff?

          1. ‘cliff’ was something we had few year ago. It hasn’t re-appeared this or last year. Perhaps the way they make tires now doesn’t result in this phenomenon.
            and yes I don’t fully trust the explanation on Vettel’s tire. I hope they look at it in better detail.

      4. @tdog, clearly visible on replay was the whole band of contact (tread?) compound from the structural carcass before the tyre deflated, it was quite clear that it was not normal wear that caused the failure.
        However I would not be at all surprised to see Bernie jump on the safety bandwagon and force the FIA to mandate 3 stops per race.

        1. …..compound parting from

    3. Given their advice was that the tyre could do 40 laps, I’m not entirely sure how useful it would have been here.

      1. So they said 40 laps….but that’s 40 laps at a pace that is lower than if you only intend to use the tire for say 20 laps. I think Seb was pushing quite a bit more than he would have wanted due to Romain closing in. There have been discussions on here and other sites before talking about normal tire wear and separately, the degradation that occurs as you push the tire more. Qualifying laps, or laps on a full tank, for example, tend to damage the tires more quickly. It’s unfortunate that it happened to Seb but he was really pushing at the end there. This is racing and these things happen.

        1. It’s unfortunate that it happened to Seb but he was really pushing at the end there.

          No, he wasn’t, and the fact that the lap times are consistent with no degradation prove it

        2. They don’t say under what circumstances the 40 laps limit is. It might be full on racing under heavy fuel for all we know….
          There is a Pirelli guy sitting in Ferrari garage. If he thought Vettel was pushing too much, he would have said something.

        3. This is supposed to be racing and there is no need for these things to happen.

          1. @hohum one of my first thoughts was that Vettel’s frequent off track excursions, particularly straight-lining at Radillon (not that he was alone on either count) may have caused some damage.

            However, by immediately pointing the finger at Ferrari’s stint length, Pirelli will look like fools if they later point to this as a contributing factor.

            1. It wasn’t something only he did, so you cannot say he couldn’t do 40 laps because he was going off at some part of the circuit constantly. The whole thing sounds ridiculous frankly. Pirelli look engineeringly incompetent at the moment.

    4. Alternatively Pirelli could design & build a tyre that can be used for racing and that does not going from working perfectly to explosive failure in the blink of an eye without warning.

    5. Maybe the incident was particularly jarring for Vettel because of what happened in 2006. He had another incident at Raidillion. It was his 3rd race in Renault 3.5 after he’d won his first 2 races. Then he had the accident, almost lost his infamous finger.

      Dunno if anyone ever asked whether that incident has anything to do with “the finger” or not?

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAf5ap0M_gQ

      1. I recall somewhere reading that was the reason for the finger.

    6. I’m astonished by this response from Pirelli. It basically amounts to “we told you our tyres weren’t good enough but you didn’t listen”.

      1. Quite so. Even if there was no rule in place imposing a maximum number of laps for any given set of tyres, what stopped them from issuing an advisory note that it was unsafe to go beyond a particular numer of laps?

        1. They said 40. Dunno if it’s worse to exaggerate or not to set any limit.

      2. Worst. They knew its gonna be dangerous but they don’t put a fight to ensure their customer safety.

        1. Neither did the teams by not accepting Pirelli’s proposal.
          Why don’t you blame the teams? Were was Vettel when Ferrari rejected the idea?

          1. Because it’s Pirelli brand image. They are the one who need to voice unsecured tyre regulation. They are the one who had better tools and research facility about tyres.
            They are a racing parts supplier. If they can give proper product, it’s their fault, not drivers or any teams.

            1. We’re talking about safety, not image. Pirelli did voice their concerns with tire usage, and they did that based on data they had. It was up to FIA, teams and drivers to listen. Maybe they did but chose to ignore it, I don’t know. It would be interesting to know why proposal was rejected.

            2. We all talking about safety here. But its tyre safety, not brake, engine, or fuel.
              If Petronas was causing engine blow, all Mercedes team can blame or reject that product. If engine blow because improper use of fuel, it’s up to Petronas to voice concern about it.

            3. the whole idea of limiting stint length to half race distance is absurd. Talk about taking strategy and tire management out of the race. In recent years, Sauber and FI among others have made extra long stints on the prime tire their primary strategy – one stopping while others do 2 or 3.

              Also, according to the 50% stint length on the primes, Grojean was also over that, as were all the drivers who pitted for the last time under the VSC.

          2. @ivan-vinitskyy

            Were was Vettel when Ferrari rejected the idea?

            Driving for Red Bull ;P

            1. with Bridgestones of course.

            2. @ivan-vinitskyy

              I didn’t knew that Vettel was using Bridgestone in 2013, Webber also used them or he used the only manufacture for that season?

      3. Just what F1 needs… another regulation. Good to hear that the teams didn’t listen.

      4. Isn’t there a guy sitting in Ferrari garage monitoring the tyres @keithcollantine ? I heard this was the strategy since the beginning, not something they came up with at the last minute either. You’d think if there was a problem, Pirelli engineer would have voiced his concern.

        1. I think Vettel also made the longest stint on the soft tyre so yeah it was their strategy from the beginning to make a 1 stop.

      5. @keithcollantine, see my reply to @tdog s earlier post.

      6. The one thing I would say in their defence is that making tyres to intentionally degrade enough to be exciting but not so much that they fail has got to be a difficult balancing act.

        Having said that, making tyres that don’t fail- certainly while they are still providing enough grip that lap times aren’t dropping off the cliff- is clearly the number one concern regardless, and failing to ensure that is disturbing.

      7. exactly the point. pirelli are desperate and it shows. i,like thousand of others, heard him distinctly say that the ‘wear life’ of the medium tyre was 40laps. looking at the images there didn’t appear to be anything distinctly wrong then a catastrophic failure. pirelli should be drummed out and michelin brought back into the fold.

      8. @keithcollantine I don’t really understand what kind of a defence this is meant to be. Basically, Pirrelli wanted to make tyres that only lasted that length, and were told no. So why is it a defense that they haven’t created products which are fit for purpose? It’s a shame because initially I thought that Hembery’s comments were fairly measured – to the effect that he’s not going to get into passing around blame. But this just sounds like sour grapes.

        If I were running a race team and the tyre manufacturer said to me that the tyres would only last a certain distance, I would be assuming that they were talking about the competitive performance lifespan – i.e. the duration where the tyres would give useful performance before the performance started to drop off significantly. I wouldn’t, and I don’t think any F1 teams would, assume they meant that this was the life of the tyre to the point of catastrophic failure. They haven’t offered any other explanation so presumably what they’re saying is that their tyres are now designed in such a way that they will give useful performance right until the tyre delaminates and blows itself apart off the rim. It’s not a defence – it’s a tacit admission that they’ve brought a dangerous and unreliable product to the world’s fastest motorsport. Absolutely unbelievable.

      9. @keithcollantine I hear you about being astonished by what Pirelli has essentially said as per your quote. But as I think of it, we all know the Pirelli’s aren’t good enough. They’ve been mandated thus. The drivers hate them. F1 wants/needs the tires to be the show as they can’t get off their aero addiction. The only way that works is to have one maker, and that one maker must make tires inferior to what they themselves are capable of making. Going hand in hand with that is the marketing impact Pirelli gets when tires is the majority story throughout the season. The negative for Pirelli is that their tires are perceived as bad, so by pointing out essentially in their response “we told you our tires weren’t good enough” I’m sure they would add to that comment…”as mandated by you, F1.” ie. “don’t look at us.”

        I continue to be all for a tire competition amongst the other competitions that are within F1. Let’s not call it a war unless we want to call all other aspects of F1, namely PU’s, chassis, drivers, engineers, teams, pit crews etc etc, a war as well. Let’s not assume a tire competition would immediately mean processions as that is as much to do with the aero addiction as anything, and a diminishing of that can be mandated too. Let’s remember that things such as unlimited testing were the reality the last time a tire competition took place. Circumstances are different and can be mandated to ensure two tire makers have a healthy competition and marketing impact while the racing improves. The only thing stopping this from happening is the motivation of F1. It is physically and financially feasible to put these drivers on better tires for a better product on the track in the name of racers actually being able to push their cars and themselves to the limits safely.

        What is the upside right now to what we have? I can’t see it. We have processions in spite of the gadget tires and DRS. The drivers hate them and they are limited from enthralling us fans. They are not even safe, in spite of the conservation required. Try getting aggressive and you ruin your strategy overall, if not blow your tires up. Thanks F1 for the tire monopoly you have thrust upon yourself. This is what happens with monopolies. And to think Michelin’s tires couldn’t handle one corner of one track, that being at Indy, and look at what happened to them for that blunder. Pirelli is in their own bubble, the only option, and this is what we get.

        1. @robbie While I agree that with one manufacturer, you’re at the mercy of whatever product they turn up with, I don’t think it’s fair to say that this is simply a consequence of the mandate given to them by the FIA and FOM. If we’re to interpret Hembery’s statement, we can infer from it that the characteristic of the tyre is that it will deliver a normal level of performance, with low performance drop-off, until it wears down to a certain point. At which point it explodes. And there’s no way that Pirrelli can give an accurate indication of when that might be, because they’re not able to simulate the real world stresses of F1 racing. This is a very different proposition to a tyre which may rapidly wear out and suffer a significant performance dropoff. Essentially these current tyres give no warning before they blow up. That’s a massive concern.

          1. @mazdachris Fair comment. I wasn’t really trying to boil it down to it simply being the mandate as I know it is complicated, but I can see how my wording made it seem that way. I would perhaps debate the definitions of normal level of performance or low performance drop-off, given that it seems the tires are good for an out lap, a hot lap, and then a bunch of conservation, and many examples this season of a blokes tires becoming shot while he is still trying to get in a reasonable stint such that an extra stop is not needed. I would think the drivers would say they have a rapid falloff in performance after a few laps, after which conservation is needed, and following a car is detrimental, and I think we all know generally that SV was pushing his luck as we all know the level of conservation current tires need, and long stints generally don’t equate to conservation but rather overuse. I don’t blame Pirelli for not knowing when they might explode, however in spite of the lack of testing they do have a ton of real-world data from the races run so far over these seasons of them being the maker. They theoretically have learned from a couple of seasons ago when the mid-season changes were required after exploding tires, and now with two incidents from this weekend they can pour over that data too. I blame F1 for the direction they have gone with the overemphasis on tires being the story from one maker.

            1. @robbie I think we can say that Vettel/Ferrari were pushing their luck, but only in terms of performance dropoff. They would have been prepared for the possibility that performance would have fallen off the cliff but I don’t think they would have reasonably expected a sudden tyre failure, especially when the performance hadn’t dropped off any more than it had for most others on the same tyre.

              If you think about tyre life, then you’re thinking in terms of performance more than anything else. The tyre should always be robust enough to stay in tact long after the performance lifespan has been exhausted. You’ll inevitably get a short period of a lap or two when the tyre is at its absolute best, then a period of gradual performance loss, before the performance loss becomes very severe which is the point where the tyre has been ‘used up’. The problem here is that the performance of the tyre never got to that point – the performance the tyre was giving up was still reasonable, the cliff hadn’t been reached and there were no suggestions that it was excessively hot. It simply exploded. Sure, they pushed their luck, but that’s what racers and racing teams do. I remember Hamilton pushing his luck with a set of Bridgestone semis that ran down to the canvas and sent him into a gravel trap but remained completely intact. A tyre which explodes without warning is a bad tyre, and the only people who are responsible for that are Pirelli.

    7. I like it how they imply that overshooting the tyre life as proposed 22 months ago by 5 laps (or 22%) it is normal for their tyres to explode.

      If Pirelli is that concerned about teams using their tyres for too long, why do we never hear safety complaints when drivers overshoot their advice by 5 or 10% of the proposed tyre life of late 2013?

    8. The proposal put forward a maximum distance equivalent to 50% of the grand prix distance for the prime tyre and 30% for the option.

      30% * 43 laps = 12/13 laps

      Is Pirelli saying that Ferrari was also wrong in their first stint?

      These conditions, if applied today at Spa, would have limited the maximum number of laps on the medium compound to 22.

      So, a life of 40 laps means that they won’t last more than 22. Got it.

    9. That statement sounds ridiculous.

      1. What’s the point for different compounds then anyway…. It already doesn’t make sense since the optimal strategies are pretty much engineered perfectly. Whole high deg tyre thing is ridiculous.

    10. I’m guessing it’s a maths question.
      Every tire has end of life and teams did not want to agree on this specific figure.
      If they did and requested 40 laps then I’m sure Pirelli would have done more tests and made changes so 99% of their tires would do 40 laps.

    11. If Pirelli were ignored I could understand them being annoyed about this but I was under the impression that they said 40 laps earlier…

      Maybe they should stop listening to the fia and build the tyres they want since they can’t seem to meet the fias designs without issues.

      1. For the record I’m against a limit on laps since it ignores the drivers who take care of their tyres and try and go further than normal even if that does cause issues like today.

        1. Drivers who look after their tires is a myth.
          ‘even if that does cause issues like today’ – today could have ended up with a trip to hospital. You really think that’s ok?

          1. @ivan-vinitsky plenty of drivers have a smooth style that looks after their tyres and has allowed drivers to one stop in the past.

            The second part of my comment was poorly phrased, I obviously don’t want to see that.

    12. Wow… They always blame mysterious debris cutting the tires, today they blamed Ferrari after the race, and now they are directly attacking the FIA.

      What do these people need to happen to feel guilty and accept it? Someone dying?

    13. That is such a great idea! Drivers already have to start on Q2 tyres and use both compounds, now we only need mandatory stint lengths to completely remove any sort of strategic variable from the sport! I sincerely believe this idea will be welcomed by teams and fans alike, and hope it will be enforced right away!

      /sarcasm

      1. Not necessarily, Pirelli could present three possible tyre strategy from three different compound. Its 3^3 or 27 available strategic option presented in fortune cookie to be pick by driver at the end of qualification.

    14. What’s the point of having mandatory limits, when you are terrible at determining said limits?

      Yes, I’m talking about those “40 laps tyre life” that explode after 28.

      An estimate with 30% margin of error isn’t an estimate anymore, is wild guessing.

      1. What’s the point of researching tire limits when nobody wants to follow them?

        1. What’s the point of researching tire limits when nobody wants to follow them

          When did that happened? Because the Pirelli quote doesn’t say what you think it says

          1. “Pirelli requested that there should be rules to govern…” – “This request was not accepted.”

            1. Thanks for proving my point.

        2. @ivan-vinitskyy Tyre limits are enforced by the FIA, teams have no choice but to follow them, and mind you, having tyre limits enforced by regulations is a ridiculous situation in itself, caused by a below-par component.

          1. Some, not all, clearly there were reasons Pirelli wanted to limit maximum number of laps on the same set. Every component in an F1 car has life expectancy, are they all below par?

            1. I’d be happy with a 5 race limit, like the PU minimum life expectancy.

        3. @ivan-vinitskyy F1 teams do follow them, though. That’s the whole reason why Ferrari chose the strategy the did.

          1. Camber, pressure, same set on 4 wheels and some other things are enforced and followed by the team. Max laps on same tire is not.
            I could be wrong but I think max laps per set figure is a rough estimate that Pirelli currently give to teams but it’s not officially enforced so Pirelli probably don’t spend much effort in calculating this figure.

            1. @ivan-vinitskyy Things not being regulated doesn’t mean aren’t followed. Pirelli put a limit of 40 lap for this race and Ferrari was following. And it still didn’t work. That’s the problem.

            2. Did anyone go that distance on any of the tires during practice? I think this might be down to a lack of adequate testing myself.

        4. Tire wear is such an X factor. Pirelli can say 40 or 22 or how ever many laps before a tire is dangerous. But the wear of the tire can be controlled to an extent by the way a driver is using the tires. I’ve made tires last multiple race weekends because of the cost of a new set. I am just saying that a driver has a certain amount of control over tire wear and is aware, based on feedback from the car, when tires are going off.

      2. In most industries, a 5% confidence interval is considered huge. I don’t understand how Pirelli thinks it’s normal to be 30% off with their predictions …

    15. I had, and continue to have, some sympathy for Pirelli, given the difficult job they have been tasked with and the limited testing which they can undertake.

      Nevertheless, I have the feeling that in years to come PR students will study today’s events as a textbook example of how not to handle product disasters.

      1. @ tyler……i have absolutely no sympathy for pirelli. if the tyres are not performing for whatever reason it is pirelli’s sole responsibility to say ‘NO’ to the requests made by the FIA. they must shoulder all the blame for this possible life threatening event.

    16. utterly absurd, how about they make tyres that are safe.

      1. Absurd is a sport asking a tyre manufacturer to make tyres that will degrade to help improve the racing, rather than get from A to B as quickly as possible, then expecting there to never be any consequences.

        I can understand Vettel’s adrenalin and annoyance filled rant, but really he should be asking why Ferrari were advising him on such an unnecessarily risky strategy when there was already a question mark over the tyres with Rosberg’s blow out. Were talking about one of the most intense tracks out there, with high speed corners and huge forces, not Abu Dhabi.

        1. Was there really a queastion mark over Rosbergs tyres? Pirelli said it was debris and that was that.

          If, hypothetically, there was a structural problem with Rosbergs tyre and Pirelli would have acknowledged it, then maybe the problem with Vettel would have never happened because Ferrari (and others) would have been more careful.

    17. Ridiculous suggestion, if Pirelli can’t make tyres that don’t explode without warning then Michelin need to be getting ready to come back

    18. All my simpathy for Sebastian, but I’m really surprised on why Pirelli is still in F1, a sport that asks a manufacturer to build tyres that self destructs in the name of the “show” and, in the end, is left alone to cope with all the criticism from teams, fans & drivers…

    19. The Pirelli knee-jerk proposal is not a realistic solution.

      • Different tracks have different stress levels and conditions for tires. How would a blanket lap limit really help? Who would provide data for variable lap limits on different tracks?

      • Why doesn’t Pirelli insist on doing more comprehensive testing as a condition of their contract?

      • There are already so many requirements, regulations and limits on what teams and drivers can and cannot do, even concerning tires presently, how would such a lap limit make anything better? Imagine a race with a driver leading on somewhat worn tires who is required to pit with one lap left so he doesn’t exceed the lap limit. Maybe drivers should be required to pit every 5 laps for tires? It still would not completely eliminate blowouts.

      Is there a really good tire manufacturer out there somewhere that can supply F1 without this much drama? Just make good racing tires, that would be good.

      1. @bullmello

        • Why doesn’t Pirelli insist on doing more comprehensive testing as a condition of their contract?

        Because they know that hardly any teams could afford to run the test’s & that only letting the 3-4 teams who could woudl be giving them a big advantage over the less well funded teams.

        Pirelli would love to do more testing & the teams would in an ideal world love to do it for them, But it has to be affordable & fair to all & right now neither is possible.

        1. @gt-racer – I’d like to see Pirelli, or whoever gets the next tire contract insist that more testing is included as a part of the contract with F1. In a perfect world F1 would make sure that it would be funded as part of the contract and fair for all teams. It is the right thing to do for F1, for safety and for the tire manufacturer too. Alas, our world is less than perfect, especially when looking at how these matters are decided.

    20. How long do Michelin tires last at higher speeds with heavier cars with more down force at LeMans? Let’s quit designing tires to fail or add spectacle and make the best ones possible. Competition assured that, and this monopoly has only created various farces. F1 needs to be about excellence and pursuit of greatness, not artificial concepts dreamed up by Bernie such as self destructing tires and mandatory usage of a sub-optimal compound.

      Where else is a competition decided by forcing people to use artificial sub-optimal tools?

      1. @ olaf…..mark webber accurately summed it up when asked about tyres. he said, ‘pirelli make tyres for the show. michelin makes tyres for racing’. says it all really.

    21. The proposal put forward a maximum distance equivalent to 50% of the grand prix distance for the prime tyre and 30% for the option.

      Well if that were followed then we’d never have a 1 stop race, the possibility of which was making the 3rd place battle today very interesting until the tyre actually let go.

      Perhaps it’s time to let the tyre manufacturers show us what they can do, use (or at least allow) 1 set for the race and let the cars go racing…

      1. Exactly, this way it becomes very easy to insure you have 2 or 3 pit-stops per race (like they were asked to do) …

        These tyres were made to increase the spectacle by allowing more strategic options. If their proposal makes it in the rule book, every race will be a 2 stopper.

    22. Have Pirelli ever voiced their concerns after a one-stop race which must have broken the 30%-50% limit? There were loads of one-stoppers since then. Not to mention that it’s completely contradictory to their ‘lasting 40 laps’ comment.
      Who knew asking tyres that would fall off first as a sign of excessive wearing before a sudden explosion is such a tall order.

      1. They didn’t open their mouth last year when Nico Rosberg completed the Russian GP ON A SINGLE SET OF TIRES after he pitted on lap 1 of the race

    23. …or you could have made better tyres.

    24. It all really is just down to the gimmicks, and in this case specifically, the comedy tires. Honestly just think that Vettel and Pirelli are put in a bad position by each other and the series “show runners”. It really ends up just becoming a no win scenario. Durable tires would be bad “show”, and comedy tires are dangerous. If the tire gives to much warning to degaradation, its to much feedback to an already to controlled sport, less feedback, is a danger. Even danger it’s self, is close to hitting a critical mass in F1. It has to be safe, but it can’t be. One group says the other wants one thing and the other says something else. Since the about first half of 2011 my viewership of f1 has declined periodically (thanks to comedy tires and drs and other doohickeys), till where it is now. I think i have seen maybe 2 races in the entirety of this year. Still watch plenty of other stuff, and sort of keep up with f1 news but that is it. Used to watch religiously in my case since 1992 barring occasional periods of non watching for a month maybe here or there in certain periods. But these were rare. The calendar is also yet another “marvel”. I hope the Azerbajian GP is the first track with a short cut and 5 drs zones.

    25. I didn’t know it was so difficult to make a tire that could do 100 laps without blowing up, yet has a lot less grip than when it was new after 20 laps.

      They shouldn’t blow up no matter what. The structural integrity is the problem here – the carcass especially. The outer part should lose tread and thus grip but not cause the inner tire to explode.

      Not that we’d expect Pirelli to “get” that.

    26. If Pirelli really believed this then the maximum tyre life idea could have been forced through. It seems to me that they are just trying to cover themselves. Also I find it odd the Hembrey could INSTANTLY say that the failure of his tyre was solely caused by Ferrari running long but the Nico failure (after only about 11 laps) needed an overnight investigation before the blame was but on Mercedes because part of the bodywork touched the tyre.

    27. If Pirelli think 50% for the prime and 30% for the option is the extreme limits then they must have been having kittens for much of the season with the 1-stop races we had…not that they did anything about that.

    28. Why is it that Vettel could still drive the car after the blow out. Look at the top picture in this artical and you will see that the structure of the tire is still there. The top trim is missing. There was no blow out.
      http://www.grandprix247.com/2015/08/24/vettel-its-unacceptable/

    29. If they do introduce maximum laps for the tyres, the drivers will just push the tyres harder because they know they can do less laps on them. This would probably stress the tyres more than they are stressed now. I would think these tyres would then fail more often, based on this weekends blowouts. Seems like Pirelli is desperate for the exposure F1 brings and would agree to anything the FIA asks them to do. In contrast Michelin seems to be more a company that says we are the tyre experts, this is the tyre we will make for you, this is the best for you, we are not compromising on this, even if it means we do not get the contract.

      Guess which company’s tyres I will be buying?

    30. How about Pirelli man up and accept that a tyre, regardless of it’s expected lifespan should fail first by loosing grip at a massive rate, so much so that no driver would be able to continue on them. Long before the construction lets go. Blow-outs without warning is simply too dangerous. The stint length is not the problem, the tyres are. So how about they fix that.

    31. i don’t get the hate for pirelli. They do as they are told, can’t test as much as they would like and it’s just the first tyre that blows with no warning this season, as far as i can remember. Do people know how many parts that have supposed to live longer have broken down this season? a lot. If you produce things, there is a failure rate. Could be this was just a bad tyre and that there are more bad tyres, but because they rarely get pushed to the limit we never know. Vettel did about 189km, more than half a race, on that set and if there is a faulty tire, that would be the moment to pop up. it’s stupid to expect 100% tires, but impose all kind of rules on how not to create such tyres.

      1. @thetick Maybe it was a faulty tyre, it’s something that can definitely happen. But I expect the quality control on Pirelli’s side to be very strict and problems like that should be very very rare.
        But even if it was a faulty tyre Pirelli should have just recognized it, they should have said that it was not supposed to happen and they’ll look into it to avoid any other tyre explosions in the future.

        Instead they just put the blame on Ferrari because they ran a slightly longer stint than usual and now they say that it could have been avoided if the teams listened to a crazy proposal which completely kills interesting strategies.

        I don’t hate Pirelli, they’re definitely in a very difficult position because they have very little testing and their product sometimes is not good enough. But they could’ve handled this situation in many ways and they chose the worst possible one.

      2. The hate comes because the situation is so easily avoidable and Pirelli has rolled over and let people who do not make tires effectively design the tires for them. The ENTIRE philosophy of Pirelli F1 tires is wrong- “maximum number of laps”, “thermal degradation”, hell- even “we’ll select the compounds for each race”… It is an embarrassment and it is not F1. I feel sorry for the Engineers who design such amazing cars and then have to bolt on such rubbish. Pirelli can make a good tire, but in this case they purposefully do not- thus they, the FIA and FOM deserve the hate they get. The egos have won- for now.

    32. Those that said 40 laps under a different condition, its a racing tyre ofcourse its under racing condition. Pinacle of MOTORSPORT not granny driving..

    33. Quite frankly it doesn’t matter whether the limit of a tyre is 3 laps or 100 laps, the simple fact of the matter is that when that limit is reached the first thing that happens to tell you you’re over that limit should not be complete failure. The way Pirelli just bluntly stated “He went over the limit of the tyre” as if explosion should be the expected result is crackers.

    34. They said first the rest of the teams where not using their tires for so many laps… forgetting Teams establish their stints in terms of PERFORMANCE.

      Now they Say they already proposed last year to establish a limit and Teams didn’t want… blah blah blah

      I strongly disagree with what Pirelli says. This is a SECURITY issue, so, is Pirelli who has to establish CLEARLY what is the limit of their tires, period.

    35. A couple of things, firstly the tire didn’t explode it delimated (ie the tread came away from the carcass) the carcass then exploded once it was running on the track without a tread.

      Secondly, if we think that this situation is bad (which I do), how many times do you think it will occur next year when teams get to choose which compound to take to the races rather than the compounds which Pirelli deems to be the correct/safest choices? I presume Pirelli are going to.make a recommendation for each track and teams can then choose whether to deviate from that or not.

    36. Just award the points after quali and do away with the strategy and danger associated with racing altogether. Think of the children.

    37. The whole concept of different compounds and the mandatory stop rule is to prevent a driver from running a race distance on a single set of tyres. What percentage of laps each compound should last is debatable, but clearly Ferrari stretched the tyres to and beyond their limit. We often see risky strategies but the worst scenario would be a points loss, not a scary high-speed crash, so Pirelli need to make its parametres known and followed.

      1. And what is wrong with running a race distance on a single set of tires? Someone figured it was “bad for the show”- can’t have that, lets make some BS rules to prevent it. Hey- I have a good idea- let’s make tires that are crap. That way the teams will have to keep stopping to change crap tires for more crap tires- even though they are running laps 10s slower than qualifying…

        Here’s an answer- give them faster tires so the fastest race strategy is to run 1-2 stops and let them choose their compounds! Wouldn’t it be nice to see drivers near their qualifying lap times in a race??? Pirelli shouldn’t dictate anything to the teams- they are smart enough to figure it out themselves. Let them race!!!

      2. but clearly Ferrari stretched the tyres to and beyond their limit.

        According to Pirelli no, but if you have data to back your claim it will be welcome

    38. Just got off the phone with someone from Force India who told me that there was a number of ‘damaged’ Pirelli tyres over the weekend.

      A number of teams raised the issue with both Pirelli & the FIA & all runoff areas were cleaned toughly several times over Saturday/Sunday ensure no debris was left in places where drivers would run.

      I was also told that the same problems were showing up on GP2 & GP3 cars but that there were no tyre issues with the Porsche Supercup cars (Which use Michelin tyres).

      With regards to Ferrari, I’m hearing that there were no signs of excessive wear & that nobody at Ferrari (Including the Pirelli tyre engineer) had any reason to doubt the strategy they were on.

    39. Strange it seems like it was just yesterday when every comment said “Pirelli is making the tyres they are asked to do and it would be exactly the same with any tyre supplier”.

      1. @rethla Pirelli are only asked to make high-deg tyres there not actually told/forced to & could easily make more durable tyres if they wanted to.
        The degredation thing isn’t actually even written in the contract, Its just a verbal request made by Bernie which whoever the tyre supplier is can ignore if they want.

        Michelin wrote it into there proposal (Which the FIA accepted) that they would not make tyres designed to wear & would focus on performance & showcasing there tyre technology.

    40. Pirelli have a tyre afety problem on their hands.
      Pirelli should look for better/stronger glue to use between thread and side wall.

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