Pirelli ‘very happy’ with first F1 test

Pirelli ran their first test with their prototype F1 tires at Paul Ricard last week with motorsport director Paul Hembery declaring he was "very happy" with the initial results.

Pirelli will take over from Bridgestone next season as Formula One's official tire supplier and already a great deal of work has gone into designing next year's rubber.

The prototype tires have even already undergone their first track test with Pirelli putting the rubber through its paces at Paul Ricard last week, using a GP2 car.

"We've started some initial testing on the GP2 car, we had the first runs at Paul Ricard," Hembery told Manipe F1. "It was very successful, we're very happy with the performance of the product for the first test."

As for reports that Pirelli could yet use an old Toyota F1 chassis for further testing, Hembery revealed: "The 2010 Toyota didn't do its pre-season (testing) but the 2009 car is a possibility.

"We will know next week which car we're going to use for the testing up until the Abu Dhabi official test with teams."