Pirelli will not bring the super-soft tyre, which was criticised by several drivers last weekend, to the German Grand Prix.
F1’s official tyre supplier has confirmed it will ‘skip’ the super-tyre in its selection for the second time this year, as it did at the Chinese Grand Prix. It has nominated the ultra-soft, soft and medium compounds for F1’s first race at the Hockenheimring since 2016.Romain Grosjean said the super-soft tyre was “rubbish” when asked why the drivers were not able to go any quicker on it last weekend than they could with the soft.
“It’s not quite normal that we go faster on the soft,” said Grosjean. “It just shows that it’s not exactly where it should be. The super should go faster.
“Obviously you expect more degradation, which you have, but it’s just a harder tyre to drive. You don’t have much rear support in the car, it’s more pointy, more difficult to drive. You can’t push it as hard as you would like.”
| 2018 tyres | 2017 tyres | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Melbourne | Soft | Super-soft | Ultra-soft | Soft | Super-soft | Ultra-soft |
| Bahrain | Medium | Soft | Super-soft | Medium | Soft | Super-soft |
| Shanghai | Medium | Soft | Ultra-soft | Medium | Soft | Super-soft |
| Baku | Soft | Super-soft | Ultra-soft | Medium | Soft | Super-soft |
| Catalunya | Medium | Soft | Super-soft | Hard | Medium | Soft |
| Monte-Carlo | Super-soft | Ultra-soft | Hyper-soft | Soft | Super-soft | Ultra-soft |
| Montreal | Super-soft | Ultra-soft | Hyper-soft | Soft | Super-soft | Ultra-soft |
| Paul Ricard | Soft | Super-soft | Ultra-soft | n/a | n/a | n/a |
| Red Bull Ring | Soft | Super-soft | Ultra-soft | Soft | Super-soft | Ultra-soft |
| Silverstone | Hard | Medium | Soft | Medium | Soft | Super-soft |
| Hockenheimring | Medium | Soft | Ultra-soft | n/a | n/a | n/a |
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Jere (@jerejj)
17th May 2018, 14:26
Hopefully, the ultra-soft compound is going to be chosen for Hungaroring and Monza as well, and hypersoft for Singapore, Sochi, and YMC.
Matteo (@m-bagattini)
17th May 2018, 15:01
I wonder what will happen with the hard compound in Silverstone, that set could probably last Friday to Sunday
HK (@me4me)
17th May 2018, 15:27
In my opinion Pirelli are still selecting too hard tyre compounds. We’re not getting enough pit-stops and strategic opportunities. I’d like to see the hyper-softs on many more occations, even if that means it’ll only be viable to use in qualifying and the first 5 laps in the race.
Apexor
20th May 2018, 22:41
Two pit stops are good enough for me. You don’t want F1 to become nascar.
OllieJ (@olliej)
17th May 2018, 15:32
Why aren’t they regularly skipping stages anyway? I thought that’s what they were supposed to be doing to add variety, especially now there are so many compounds
Euro Brun (@eurobrun)
17th May 2018, 15:43
@olliej
Not really no. They have no obligation. They’ve only done it once before (China) and commented that they ‘may’ do it again, despite most people wanting them to do it everytime.
It makes sense to vary it up and I’m glad they have done, but the timing smacks of knee-jerk reactions from Pirelli following comments this weekend rather than a carefully considered decision by them.
Tristan (@skipgamer)
17th May 2018, 16:40
This is good, I hope they keep switching things up and allow different tyres to be compared at different circuits under different conditions so they can see which tyres are consistently working and which ones aren’t.
Then they can focus on improving the compounds that aren’t working for the next year. This is not a bad model at all and should end up eventually providing a variety of quality compounds. Much better than only having a few compounds to play with, this way they get to use the races as a test for a compound and if it’s not working they have plenty of other compounds they can bring instead later in the season.
Driomed
17th May 2018, 17:02
Ooh, I tire of tyres (tires too).
Vettel fan 17 (@)
17th May 2018, 18:22
They should get rid of the hard and medium tyres. The hards in Britain looks like a forced decision if I’m honest. Mediums have come into play on several occasions but it’s mostly just to do a one stop race. Getting rid of them will encourage two stop races.