Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsPirelli

Free tyre choice proposal set to be dropped

Plans to introduce a free tyre choice for teams in 2016 are set to be dropped, with Pirelli saying the idea “would change very little”.

Following a meeting of the Strategy Group in May, it was announced each team would be allowed to choose any two of the four available tyre compounds for each race next season. However, with Pirelli not part of the Strategy Group and therefore not consulted during the discussions, there have been a number of concerns raised since the decision was taken.

Speaking exclusively to F1i, when asked if the proposal was now off the table, Hembery replied: “I wouldn’t say it’s off the table but … it sounds like a romantic notion but in reality it would change very little because you’ve only got four to choose from.

“We would never be able to allow some crazy choices - supersofts at Silverstone, for example - so in reality you would end up with everybody actually choosing more or less the same anyway.

“So it’s not really going to deliver what was required. That’s something we are looking at going forward, that we can maybe add something in that allows us to give a fair bit of flexibility to the system but also delivers the end result which is a little bit more unpredictability.”

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.