Red Bull tyre cooling allegations receive first report from Pirelli findings

Pirelli has addressed allegations that McLaren has added water to its tyres to improve cooling.

During the Brazilian Grand Prix weekend, word spread that Red Bull Racing suspected several competitors, including McLaren, of adding water to its tyres in order to keep those tires cooler.

Adding liquid to tyres with an eye to cooling them would be directly against the rules, but according to Pirelli, nothing unusual has turned up when analysing tyres after a race weekend.

Earlier in the Brazilian Grand Prix weekend, Auto Motor und Sport reported that Red Bull Racing stated it suspected several teams, including McLaren, of injecting water into their Pirelli tyres in order to improve cooling.

Motorsport.com now reports that these suspicions erupted after the Singapore Grand Prix.

Per various reports, Red Bull suspected that some of its competitors were injecting small amounts of water into their tires via the valves. The amount of water would have been large enough to make for an appreciable change in tyre temperatures, but not so large as to be detected by Pirelli after the race.

As with many aspects of F1, tires are extremely well regulated. Every tyre features a barcode scanned by Pirelli to track its use, and Pirelli itself mounts a team’s tyre onto its wheels.

Further, Pirelli technicians and other scrutineers are omnipresent forces in the Formula 1 paddock. This would make it extremely challenging — though not impossible — to manipulate the tyres without being caught.

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According to Motorsport.com, initial concerns were raised in Singapore when moisture was spotted inside the wheel rims after the tyres were stripped from the cars after the race.

The FIA has been investigating this matter, and head of single seats, Nikolas Tombazis, also spoke with Pirelli to request additional oversight.

However, Pirelli told Motorsport.com that it has not noticed any abnormal behavior.

“I cannot see anything strange from the data we have,” Mario Isola, Pirelli’s head of F1 and car racing, said. “I don’t have any evidence.”

Isola did state that it would be “very easy” to inject water into the tyres, but that doing so would necessarily come with tradeoffs in terms of tyre pressure.

While Isola would not entirely rule out the possibility that a team was utilizing water inside its tyres, he reiterated that “I am not aware of any issue” but that he and Pirelli will support the FIA with any ongoing investigations.

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