On Tuesday Pirelli completed its private testing campaign ahead of the 2011 Formula 1 season, for which the Italian tyre firm has been appointed sole supplier in a three-year agreement until 2013. Spanish driver Pedro de la Rosa spent four days at the wheel of the Toyota TF109 that is used to test the Italian rubber.
Pirelli’s wet weather test made history, as it was the first time that a Formula 1 car had been run in wet conditions in the dark. In order to replicate rainy conditions, tankers dampened the 3.1-kilometre north loop of the Yas Marina circuit – the venue for the final Grand Prix of the 2010 F1 calendar – with approximately 140,000 litres of water over two evening sessions that lasted from six in the evening through to midnight. With floodlights covering the length of the track, the Yas Marina circuit boasts the largest bespoke sports lighting facility in the world.
Throughout the two days of dry running in Abu Dhabi that preceded the wet test, Pirelli completed 1,400 kilometres of running, going through all four compounds in the dry tyre range, from super-soft to hard. In total, Pirelli completed more than 2,000 kilometres in Abu Dhabi to add to the 1,100 kilometres racked up in Bahrain last week. This brings the total testing kilometres accumulated by Pirelli to more than 20,000, since the first tyres took to the Italian circuit of Mugello in August.
De la Rosa, who has been Pirelli’s official tester since October, commented: "In my opinion, Pirelli is ready now for Formula 1. The dry tyre test went very well, and confirmed everything we had learned in Bahrain the week before. But the most original part of the test was when we were running at night on the wet tyres, which was as new an experience for me as it was for everyone else.
"The most important thing was that the water levels were consistent, which allowed us to have some accurate results from the test. At the end of it, we’ve come up with two tyres – wet and intermediate – which I believe are both competitive and stable."
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