Formula one driver, Lewis Hamilton has talked to Pirelli about providing better tyres from 2022 onwards for Formula one races . Pirelli has been the sole tyre supplier since the year 2011 and ever since then, they have been criticised for providing tyres with high degradation levels.
The aim has always been to provide a race with multiple pit stops and different strategies. However, F1 teams find it difficult to consider pit stops since they lose their pace. Drivers have to pit seconds off the pace to manage their tyres and consider a one-stop strategy.
Theoretically, tyre degradation should create a huge difference since this will lead to difference in performance between cars which overtakes other drivers but in reality, drivers state that they cannot overtake the car in front since they have to manage their tyres.
The three major races in which tyre failures was commonly seen by every F1 team resulted in Hamilton to call on Pirelli to change its approach from 2022 onwards when F1 will introduce new regulations.
Lewis Hamilton stated "Moving forward, probably not for next year, but for 2022, we need a better tyre, a tyre that gives us more grip, better safety -- a key matter there -- and enables us to drive closer to other cars and give the fans better racing.
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"Right now we are doing a serious amount of [tyre] management today, and I don't think that's what the fans want. Managing for multiple seconds behind another car, that's not good enough.
"We want to help Pirelli to make a better tyre if they can. And that's obviously the question."
Pirelli designs the characteristics of its tyres based on the requirement prescribed in a target letter from F1, which mentions about the performance and degradation levels aimed at creating exciting races. Hamilton believes that part of F1's tyre issues have been created as a result of the target letter. He believes that F1 and Pirelli will listen to the drivers as to what kind of changes in the tyres must be made for the year 2022.
Hamilton mentioned- "I think moving forward we really need to put a lot of pressure on Pirelli for the future," he added. "Unfortunately, they didn't do a great job at the end of last year to develop the 2020 tyre, so unfortunately we had to carry this tyre, the same as 2019, over into this season.
He added, "When they made the target letter in the past, the drivers were not a part of that discussion. So that's why I went to the meeting in Paris [last year] as a representative for the drivers, because we want to make sure they set the target letter correctly, because it's not been done right for a long time."
