Pirelli’s test protocol in Germany 
The Grand Prix layout at the Nurburgring was back in use this week, with Mercedes and McLaren both taking over the German circuit. The brief was simple, and pretty strict: a Pirelli tyre test run on 2026-spec cars. The long Nordschleife route was never going to be part of the official programme, and quite right too.
The drivers split the workload across 48 hours. George Russell and Oscar Piastri got the running started on Tuesday. Reigning world champion Lando Norris and championship leader Kimi Antonelli took over on Wednesday. The damp morning air on day one meant intermediate tyres were the obvious call. As the track gradually dried, the teams were able to start gathering data on the C3 compound.
Mechanical limits and the stopwatch
The focus was on short runs, with stints capped at eight laps. A technical problem brought Oscar Piastri’s McLaren session to an early end. The Australian’s tally stopped at 65 laps, with a best of 1’35″096. His Mercedes counterpart completed 127 laps and posted 1’33″899.
Wednesday’s work called for softer rubber. Antonelli ran the C4 compound. Norris was on C5. The Briton set the fastest lap of the test overall, clocking 1’32″990 over 109 laps. The Italian was second with 1’33″640 from 108 laps. Woking’s technical staff have already given the thumbs-up to the value of the run ahead of Miami.
Parallel promo duties
Silverstone was also busy with another single-seater on track. Franco Colapinto carried out a commercial run in the Alpine A526. It was the French team’s second filming day of the current campaign.
The rules for the session were tight. Mileage was capped at 200 kilometres, and only non-competitive demo tyres were allowed. Alpine’s flier will be back on promo duty next week with an exhibition in Buenos Aires.
Ferrari are also in the constructor running schedule. A filming session is set for next week at Monza, giving the team the paperwork they need to validate their new engine architecture during full-bore running at the Italian track.
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