Pirelli’s prototype 2021 tyres will finally be trialled by Formula 1 teams during practice for the Portuguese Grand Prix.
Pirelli is set to retain its current tyres for a third successive season, after the 2020 sets were rejected last December, but tweaks are being made to cope with altered technical regulations and downforce levels.
Formula 1 teams were supposed to trial the tyres during FP2 at the second Silverstone race but this was delayed in the wake of the failures suffered during the first round at the track.
Another proposed outing for Barcelona was then subsequently postponed.
Formula 1 will visit Portugal’s Portimao circuit for the first time next month and 30 minutes of track time is due to be set aside in order to assist Pirelli.
“We decided to postpone the tests which were planned at the second race at Silverstone and Barcelona to redesign some prototypes with the extra time to slightly revise the construction for next year,” said Pirelli’s Formula 1 chief Mario Isola.
“It’s only 30 minutes. We will supply different run plans for different teams in order to collect as much information as we can to define the tyre for next year.
“This is planned for Portimao. It’s a new track. We don’t have a lot of data from Portimao.
“From now onwards, we have a lot of new tracks so we decided on which track we want to test and that is Portimao, which is a high severity circuit where we probably find some good weather and that is why we decided to nominate Portimao for our test.”
