McLaren and Alpine snub fastest Pirelli tyres for Bahrain test

Pirelli has released its list of tyre allocations and compounds for all ten Formula 1 teams for this week’s three-day pre-season test at the Bahrain International Circuit that will kick off on Wednesday.

Pirelli has hauled its full array of compounds to Sakhir, and even included its intermediary and wet tyres in its selection although there are no signs on the horizon of rain drenching Bahrain’s barren landscape.

Overall, each team will have 35 sets of tyres, divided up according to each outfit’s selection, and spanning from the hard-to-soft C1 to C5 rubber.

Testing is all about accumulating as much mileage as possible, so teams have logically weighed their choice towards Pirelli’s two C1 and C2 white-rimmed hard compounds and especially towards its yellow-rimmed C3 medium tyre.

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A glance at the graphic hereunder shows Mercedes topping the C3 selection, with the Brackley stockpiling 25 sets of the medium rubber, with Red Bull choosing 20 sets.

At the other end of the spectrum, Stake F1 and Williams have opted to put only 16 and 15 sets of mediums in their inventory.

Looking at the selection of hard tyres, Mercedes apparently plans to do little running on the latter, contrary to Red Bull, or especially Alpine for that matter.

While teams will work diligently during three days on their new cars’ settings, prioritizing reliability and consistency over outright performance, the final day of testing typically sees a few drivers bolting on a set of softs for the purpose of topping the session and claiming bragging rights for their sponsors.

But that definitely won’t be the case for McLaren and Alpine, with both teams snubbing Pirelli’s C4 and C5 sticky rubber, and even Red Bull disregarding the C5.

Mercedes and Ferrari on the other hand are takers, so don’t be surprised to see either team at the top of the timesheets at the end of Friday’s running.

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