Lastly, and perhaps most significantly, teams have been forbidden from
switching their rear tyres over.
Pirelli claimed earlier this week that the tyres at Silverstone would have
been safe had they been “used in the correct way” but that teams had
switched their rear tyres over, as well as running low pressures and high
cambers.
De la Rosa said that he expected the modifications to this weekend’s tyres –
the rears will feature Kevlar rather than steel belts – to prove adequate
but that drivers had wanted to make their position crystal clear.
“The important thing is that we are not talking about boycotting, we are not
talking about politics – we are talking about safety,” de la Rosa told Autosport.com.
“There was not one driver who was against what was decided.
“Safety is first and if there is any issue with blow-outs in the weekend we
have to think about own lives, the marshals and the fans.
“It is not worth taking any more risks. I think all the drivers have gone
through enough risk already, for the past few races and especially the last.
Boycotting is not the word at all: it is about being safe.”
“Let’s be honest. Pirelli has done a tremendous effort to bring here nearly
1000 new specification tyres, which we think will be safe enough.
“All the evidence, all the data, all the information from Charlie is that it
will be more than enough. However, we have to be clear before the weekend
starts, because if things develop we have to be prepared as a group. That is
the whole point of it.
“The point is that if there is any problem blow-out, we will stand out, think
about it, look at the case in particular and decide,” he said.
“You can have punctures; you can have blow-outs for many other reasons, if
there is a big piece of carbon fibre that goes through the tyre, that is
part of racing. There is no problem with that.
“It is being sensible and analysing what happens in particular. But we really
think that what Pirelli has brought here is safe, and they have done
incredible work to bring it here in such a short time.”
He added: “In the race, there is not much we can do. It is up to race control
to take a decision or red flag it, and Charlie has always been very
supportive of us when there has been too much water and I think we consider
this at least a similar scenario.
“We trust Charlie. He has always been very supportive of any safety concerns
so we are in his hands. But we are happy to be in his hands.”
The situation is complicated by the fact that Kimi Raikkonen, Adrian Sutil and
Valtteri Bottas are not members of the GPDA. De la Rosa said that was
irrelevant.
“We don’t care who is a GPDA member or not – the message is about safety,” he
said. “If they [the non-members] want to support us we are happy, and we
will support them no matter what – whether they are members or not.”