While the Formula 1 World Championship is living its longest forced break since the pandemic era, five weeks between the Japanese Grand Prix and Miami, the cars are not sleeping. This week the Mercedes W17s and McLaren MCL40s roared again at one of the most mythical circuits in motorsport history: the Nürburgring. And they did so for the first time since October 2020, when Lewis Hamilton won the Eifel Grand Prix and took another step toward his seventh world title.
The official reason is a tyre development test organised by Pirelli, Formula 1’s sole supplier since 2011. But beyond the regulations and the compounds, what happened on April 14 and 15 in the Eifel was a small celebration of motorsport: four of the world’s best drivers in the two best cars on the grid, pushing hard at one of the most demanding and respected circuits on the planet. And Alpine added their own note on Wednesday the 16th with Franco Colapinto at Silverstone for their second filming day of the year.
Why the test was at the Nürburgring and not in Saudi Arabia
The April Pirelli test was originally scheduled at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit, as part of the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix weekend. But when the FIA confirmed the cancellation of the Bahrain and Saudi Arabian rounds due to the Iran war and the geopolitical situation in the Middle East, the entire Pirelli test calendar had to be reorganised. Ferrari first occupied the available space with a wet tyre test at their private Fiorano circuit last week, with Lewis Hamilton accumulating 297 laps on artificially soaked asphalt. Pirelli then moved the dry compound test to the Nürburgring, a choice as practical as it is symbolic.
The modern Nürburgring, the 5.148-kilometre layout built alongside the mythical Nordschleife, offers a mix of fast, medium and slow corners that is representative for tyre development. It has old-school kerbs, reduced run-off areas in some sectors and a physical environment completely different from the urban and semi-urban circuits that dominate the current F1 calendar. For Pirelli, running here in mid-April Eifel temperatures, with cold asphalt and still-fresh air, delivers data that cannot be gathered at circuits in the Middle East or the Mediterranean.
Day 1: Russell dominates, Piastri suffers a technical problem
Tuesday April 14 the circuit was wet. Rain overnight forced the programme to start on intermediate tyres and the wait for mid-morning before the asphalt dried enough to switch to slick compounds. Once conditions allowed, Pirelli’s work plan focused on the C3 compound carcass, the medium compound of the C1-C5 range, with eight-lap runs comparing different construction variants. George Russell in the Mercedes W17 number 63 and Oscar Piastri in the McLaren MCL40 number 81 were the assigned drivers for the first day.
Russell made the most of the opportunity. The Englishman completed 127 laps equivalent to 654 kilometres and set the fastest time of the day with a 1:33.899. In the afternoon he ran the long validation stints that Pirelli’s plan required, accumulating representative mileage on the compounds the Italian technicians had identified as most interesting in the shorter morning comparisons.
For Piastri the day was more complicated. A technical problem on the MCL40 kept him in the garage from the lunch break until almost the end of the session. Although the team managed to resolve the issue and the Australian returned to the track before the end, he could only accumulate 65 laps (335 kilometres) with his best time at 1:35.096. Piastri was positive in his post session comments: it was a useful day. We cannot make changes in these tests but it is always good to have the opportunity to check all the systems are working and to better understand the car, especially with the new regulations.
Asphalt temperatures reached 37 degrees during the sunny hours though the ambient air did not exceed 15 degrees, creating an interesting thermal differential for the compound work Pirelli has planned for the colder circuits in the second half of the calendar.
Day 2: Antonelli and Norris take over. 2,106 kilometres total
Wednesday April 15 was the turn of each team’s race drivers. Kimi Antonelli, championship leader with 72 points and two victories in the first three races of the year, put the W17 number 12 on track at the Nürburgring for the first time since winning two podiums and a pole at this same circuit during the 2022 ADAC F4 German season when he was just 16 years old. The distance between those cars and the 2026 Mercedes Formula 1 car is immeasurable, but the circuit is the same.
Lando Norris, defending world champion with McLaren, had also not raced here since the 2020 Eifel Grand Prix, like Russell. For the Bristol born Englishman, returning to the Nürburgring in the MCL40 was an experience he summed up precisely in his post-test comments: this test was a very productive two days for us. The aim was to help Pirelli with their tyre development for the future and we provided as much detailed feedback as we could. It has been a while since we have driven here at the Nürburgring so it is great to get back out on track. I have driven here in pretty much every category so it is cool to be able to drive it in this era of Formula 1 cars.
The numbers from the second day confirmed the test’s productivity. Antonelli completed 109 laps with a best time of 1:32.990, while Norris was the fastest of the day and of the full test with 108 laps and a time of 1:33.640. In total across both days, Mercedes and McLaren accumulated 2,106 kilometres on the Nürburgring asphalt. Pirelli takes this data to their laboratories to continue compound development for the rest of the season and the first designs for the 2027 regulation framework.
Russell also used his media time in Germany to address Mercedes’ only genuine weak point in this opening stretch of the season: race starts. Toto Wolff’s team has won all three opening races and led every qualifying session, but the slow launches from Antonelli in Australia and Japan, where Ferrari’s smaller turbo enabled better reactions off the line, have cost the German team positions in the opening metres. Russell was direct: we are working a lot behind the scenes analysing the data. Our sport is difficult because you do not get to practice that much. We cannot do starts in a Pirelli test, that is the same for every team. We have some ideas of why we have been falling short at race starts and hopefully we can build on that.
Alpine and Colapinto: the filming day at Silverstone
While Mercedes and McLaren finished at the Nürburgring, Alpine used Wednesday to run their second and final filming day of the 2026 season with Franco Colapinto at Silverstone. The Argentine, who had qualified eight tenths behind teammate Pierre Gasly at Suzuka and finished sixteenth in the race, returned to the track for the first time since Japan.
Alpine’s Silverstone filming day was the team’s direct response to the media storm that followed the Japanese Grand Prix, where social media circulated theories that the team was deliberately hindering the Argentine driver. Alpine published an open letter rejecting those theories, confirming that Gasly and Colapinto have had the same equipment except for minor low-performance-impact components in China during a gearbox change. Colapinto’s return to the track, though limited to the 200 kilometres the regulations permit for filming days using demonstration tyres, was also a message of continuity and confidence from the team in their driver.
In a short video posted by Alpine on their social channels, Colapinto appeared relaxed and upbeat from the cockpit: we are at Silverstone. The beautiful Silverstone, one of the best tracks in the world. It is damp, wet, grey, as usual in the UK. You do not see much sunshine here. But we have the car so we are doing a filming day.
The next tests and preparation for Miami
The Nürburgring test is the third in a series of Pirelli sessions during the April break. The first was a wet tyre test at Suzuka with Red Bull and Racing Bulls immediately after the Japanese Grand Prix. The second was the Fiorano test with Ferrari and Hamilton. The fourth and for now final one before Miami is Ferrari’s filming day at Monza on April 22nd, confirmed this week by Planet F1.
The next formal Pirelli test, for wet-weather tyres, is scheduled for mid-May at Magny Cours, already with the season underway after Miami. Formula 1 returns to competition on May 1st at the Miami Grand Prix, the second sprint weekend of the year, with sprint qualifying on Saturday and the race on Sunday.
Sources: McLaren official mclaren.com/racing, Formula1.com official, Motorsport.com, Pit Debrief, AutoHebdo, Sky Sports F1, Speedcafe, RaceFans, Planet F1, Motorsport Week
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