Pirelli make last minute change to Bahrain tyre selection - The medium compound makes an early return to the 2013 season
Published by Christine
The tyre compounds available for this weekend’s Bahrain Grand Prix will be the hard tyre, the orange sidewalls, and the medium compound, the white sidewalls. This is a change on Pirelli’s part, as before the season began, they had announced the hard and soft tyres to be in use in the desert.
Coming off the back of a difficult weekend in Shanghai, Pirelli have decided to move the compounds to just one step apart, with motorsport director Paul Hembery saying: “It’s one of the most demanding tracks of the year for the tyres, mostly because of the high ambient and track temperatures. We expect about three stops per car.”
Despite the last minute switch, Hembery had previously been reluctant to give in to pressure from teams and drivers who found the soft tyre almost unusable in China. Most kept their soft tyre stint short as tyre degradation was so high, and many thought the action was compromised for tyre-saving purposes.
Immediately after the race, Hembery said: “We have to review Bahrain, we need those four races and if we do make changes we’ll announce them after Bahrain and before Barcelona.”
