Graining could become an issue in Abu Dhabi, warns Pirelli

Following the opening day at the Abu Dhabi Grand, Pirelli has warned that graining could become an issue over the weekend, albeit it should not be as extreme as it was at Las Vegas.

McLaren looked on strong form on the first day of free practice for the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. The Woking team drivers topped the time sheet in the second session, the most representative one as it took place at the same time as Sunday’s race, namely as the sun goes down.

Following his tough race in Qatar last week, Lando Norris was quickest in 1m23.517s ahead of team-mate Oscar Piastri, which indicate that McLaren have the upper hand over Constructors’ title rivals Ferrari. Charles Leclerc was fastest in the first session in 1m24.321s, but in the second he was down in sixth in 1m24.201s, while team-mate Carlos Sainz was fourth in 1m24.099s. On top of that, Leclerc has a ten place grid penalty for having had to fit one more power unit component than allowed in the sporting regulations.

The opening day of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix saw six teams elect to run a young driver, with the regulation dictating that every driver is required to give up a practice session at least once during the season. Arthur Leclerc drove for Ferrari, Felipe Drugovich for Aston Martin, Ryo Hirakawa for McLaren, Isack Hadjar for Red Bull, Luke Browning for Williams and Ayumu Iwasa for Racing Bulls. Fastest of this group was the Brazilian Drugovich, ninth overall in 1m25.471s.

Today’s lap times were considerably quicker than those from free practice last year, proof of the progress made in performance terms with these cars over the past twelve months, given that the tyre base line has remained the same: 1”751 the difference for FP1, 1’292 for FP2.

Assessing the day, Pirelli’s chief engineer Simone Berra highlighted the fact that lap times became much quicker compared to last year.

“The final round of the season said something about how much quicker the cars have become in the space of a year. The improvement in performance is significant when one considers that parameters such as the track and the tyres have remained unchanged. That can be seen from the fact that today’s best time is already 72 thousandths faster than Verstappen’s pole time of last year (1’23”445).

“The other important data concerns the use of the compounds. For the fourth time this season, after Sakhir, Melbourne and Las Vegas, no driver used the Hard tyre over the two hours of Friday free practice.

The Italian explained that teams’ tyre useage on the opening day indicates that every outfit will try to execute a one-stop strategy given the fact that no one used the white-walled hard rubber in the first two practice sessions.

“It’s a clear indication of how the C3 is definitely considered the main tyre for Sunday’s race by the teams. Furthermore, we saw that most of the drivers who did a long run, opted for the Medium. One can therefore begin to draw the conclusion that a one-stop strategy, using one set of Medium and one of Hard, must be favourite, with the second set of Hards on hand in case of a Safety Car or if degradation is greater than expected.

“Other interesting aspect from today are graining, which varied from team to team, but not in a particular impactful way, especially as degradation is also quite low, and then the track evolution, significant in FP1 before settling down in FP2,” Berra concluded.