Michael Schumacher paid a visit to the Pirelli motorhome at Mugello. The seven time world champion was heavily critical of the Italian supplier’s 2012 tyres recently in Bahrain, but boss Paul Hembery had revealed that he had yet to get together to hear first-hand about Schumacher’s gripe.
Germany’s Auto Motor und Sport said the Mercedes driver’s meeting with Pirelli lasted half an hour.
“I can imagine what was talked about,” Timo Glock grinned.
Hembery said: “Michael was with our technicians and Mercedes engineers, I do not know what was said.”
Another Pirelli employee insisted: “Nothing special to report.”
Hembery does, however, have some good news to break to Schumacher: “In 2013 our tyres will be even softer.”
As for the extreme degradation, “We are sticking with our philosophy of exciting races, until something else is asked of us”, Hembery insisted.
Mark Webber admitted there is a fine line to walk between the wishes of the teams and drivers, and the interests of the spectators.
“We would all love to have quicker lap times and extremely consistent tyres like we did in the old days,” he is quoted by AAP news agency, “but that wasn’t the most exciting thing for the racing. Trying to find somewhere in the middle is always tricky but, at the moment, we have a pretty good show for the crowd.
“Whether it’s by design or not, it’s turned out like that.”
Source:GMM
