There is now very little left before the traffic lights go out for the third race of the season. We are in Melbourne, Australia, on a path that, by observing the starting grid, promises great show. A fundamental factor will also be the strategy that the teams choose to adopt: one stop or two? What compounds to use? Let's find out together what are the indications of Pirelli for this GP.
Australian GP, here's the strategy
The strategy of race to a stop for the Australian Grand Prix she is on paper the fastest. From simulations based on the data collected to date, teams could opt for a start on the medium P Zero Yellow and a change between the seventeenth and twenty-third lap with the hard P Zero White tyres. Slightly slower is the variant that provides for the start on the Softs with a stop between the fifteenth and twenty-first lap to finish the race on the Hards.
Although slower than the one-stop race, a two-stop race is also possible, using all the compounds available in Melbourne: Softs at the traffic lights, change to Hards between the tenth and fifteenth laps and finally Medium mounted between the thirty-eighth and forty-fifth laps and carry up to the checkered flag. Unlike last year, even the softest choice of the range (C4, instead of the C5 introduced in 2022) is also part of the possible race strategies
The words of Mario Isola
The director of the Pirelli Motorsport technical area, Mario Isola, gave his idea of the weekend so far: “It was a particularly busy Saturday. After the rain on Friday had essentially prevented all the teams from collecting data on tire behavior over long distances, in the third free practice session several riders took on double work: preparing for qualifying and trying to do some long runs with lots of petrol on board. From what we have been able to see in these two days, the three compounds available behave according to expectations. On a track that still has very little rubber and with rather low temperatures, both the Softs and the Mediums showed some graining while the Hards proved to be very consistent and not that far off in terms of performance compared to the other two compounds.
Qualifying was held under the threat of rain but, apart from a few drops that fell in Q3, dry tires were always used. Beyond Verstappen's performance in the decisive phase, there was a great balance today too, considering that there are just four tenths of a second between the second and seventh classified”.
“Medium-Hard is the right combination”
“In terms of strategy, the one based on a stop remains the most accredited option: Medium-Hard is the fastest combination on paper while the Soft-Hard one is slightly slower, however confirming the goodness of the choice to have brought the C4 compound here which thus offers a wider range of possibilities than last year. Just a summary comparison with 2022 highlights how much a year of development of the new generation of single-seaters has improved performance by almost a second and a half, considering that between the time of Verstappen's pole position this year and that of Leclerc last year year is one second and one tenth and that twelve months ago the C5 was used as Soft in qualifying, about four tenths faster than the C4 chosen as the softer option for this edition of the Australian Grand Prix”.
SOURCE: Pirelli F1 Media
