Isola Optimistic on 2025 Tyre Development

Charles Leclerc’s extensive wet tyre testing at Paul Ricard shows promising results, with Pirelli’s Mario Isola optimistic about the progress towards the 2025 tyre development programme.

Charles Leclerc completed the second day of testing for Pirelli at the Paul Ricard Circuit in Castellet (France) yesterday, in collaboration with Ferrari.

The Monegasque driver was behind the wheel of the SF-24, primarily working on the development of extreme wet and intermediate tyres.

The Monaco Grand Prix winner drove on a short 3.523-kilometre track, artificially watered using the circuit’s irrigation system, with varying water volumes to closely replicate the conditions required for testing blue-banded (Extreme Wet) and green-banded (Intermediate) tyres.

By the end of the day, a total of 160 laps had been completed, equivalent to 585 kilometres, adding to the 738 kilometres driven on Tuesday in dry conditions by Carlos Sainz.

“We had two very useful days of testing, not only continuing our development programme for the compounds and construction of slick tyres but also, in the end, trying some solutions for extreme wet and intermediate tyres that we didn’t have the chance to test over the winter,” commented Mario Isola, head of Pirelli Motorsport.

“The circuit’s irrigation system allowed us to maintain a constant water level on the track surface to compare the different prototypes. Of course, there are several factors impossible to replicate during testing, such as the weather – and indeed it was a beautiful sunny day at Paul Ricard – and the fact that the track is not particularly hard on tyres.”

“Nevertheless, we gathered a lot of data that we will now analyse to see in which direction we need to go in terms of development. We are further along with the slick tyre programme and are now close to defining the construction and compounds for 2025.”

“We covered 1,350 kilometres of very useful testing, and I would like to thank Ferrari and its drivers for their support.”