Photo: Formula Motorsport Ltd
The FIA has announced that Pirelli has won the contract to be the tyre supplier to the FIA Formula 2 and Formula 3 championships for the 2025, ’26 and ’27 seasons.
Pirelli has been supplying rubber to Bruno Michel’s Formula 1 support series since 2010. At the first that was for GP3, then a year later it brought tyres for the new GP2 car. Both used 13-inch wheels.
In 2017 there was a rebrand of GP2 to F2, and in 2019 GP3 was succeeded by FIA F3. F2 switched to 20-inch wheels in 2020, one year ahead of F1, as part of Pirelli’s development of larger tyres for the top level of single-seater racing. F3 meanwhile has stuck with 13-inch wheels and this season has had to shorten several races due to tyre wear concerns.
The design philosophy of the tyres being introduced in 2025 is set to follow the current design trend of deliberately inducing wear in the rubber to add a level of tyre management to races. This is more prelevant in F2, which has longer races and also includes pitstops in its feature races.
F2 will be switching to a new car next season, the Dallara F2 2024, which teams got a first look at during the most recent round at Monza. Like the current Dallara F2 2018, it will run on 18-inch wheels.
FIA F3 meanwhile has been using the same car since 2019 and is set to switch to a new model in 2025. While a invite to tender has been published to become the engine supplier for the future car, no such document has been released for chassis supply.