Having completed a programme of wet weather running during the final day of testing at the Circuit de Catalunya-Barcelona on Thursday, drivers have confirmed that progress has been made.
Pirelli had the track artificially soaked at regular intervals throughout the day, to allow drivers to collect data and test out the wet weather tyres, having received complaints about them last season.
Early feedback has been positive in regards to the full wets, with Haas F1 Team driver Romain Grosjean giving them the thumbs up.
“It is quite interesting the wet. There is a lot of progress made from last year.
“We haven’t had too much overheating with the rear and the temperature is staying in. The warm up was okay-ish.”
The intermediate tyre was not so resilient however, and may perhaps need a bit more work, according to the Frenchman.
“The intermediates are really good for one lap and then they get destroyed a bit too early – so some work is to be done. But generally it’s a good step from where we ended up last year.”
Renault Sport Formula 1 Team driver Nico Hulkenberg meanwhile, felt that today’s programme was not done in the best way possible, as the track kept drying too quickly in the Spanish sunshine.
“It wasn’t the most efficient I think – but we tried at least.
“We didn’t do that much running because they had to wet the track and it really dried pretty quickly, so was straight into inter conditions.
“I went out one run on full wets and one run on inters to see how the car reacts and it went quite okay and I was happy with that.”
Having enough spare parts is also an area of concern for teams at this early stage of the season, and many opted not to devote too much time to running, most likely to avoid any accidents and save themselves time and money.
“But obviously it’s early in the season and it is always a bit of a risk for teams. We don’t have that many spare parts and it is always a balance to have.
“We couldn’t test very deeply regarding aquaplaning, so I think we will find out during a race weekend.”
The tyres were probably therefore, not really tested out to the levels Pirelli and the teams would have liked, which renders the final day of testing a pretty pointless affair, when it could have been put to much more efficient use.
