Oscar Piastri suffers testing setback as F1 returns to iconic track

The first day of the development test programme organised by Pirelli at the Nürburgring got under way with a few installation laps on intermediate tyres. Rain had fallen throughout the night, leaving the track wet, despite a shy sun appearing later in the morning. The drivers therefore waited for track conditions to improve before starting the programme originally planned on slick tyres.

Oscar Piastri suffered a technical problem during Pirelli tyre testing, limiting his running as F1 returned to the Nurburgring. 

Piastri and George Russell were both in action on Tuesday in Germany for McLaren and Mercedes, respectively, as both teams conducted dry weather tyre testing for Pirelli. 

Under the terms of being able to run contemporary machinery to test its 2027 tyre compounds, teams are not allowed to evaluate any performance upgrades, with their entire run-plans being laid out by Pirelli - with drivers not even aware of which compound they are testing for the 'blind' tests.

Both Piastri and Russell began their day of running by completing eight-lap runs, testing a number of construction variants of the C3 tyre, with the data gathered "promising", according to Pirelli. 

These were then tested over longer stints by Russell, as Piastri's MCL40 machine developed a technical problem, meaning he was in the garage from the lunch break almost until the end of the day. 

The Australian clocked up 65 laps with a best of 1:35.096, whilst Russell tallied 127 laps with a best of 1:33.899.

Both drivers will hand over to their team-mates, Lando Norris and Kimi Antonelli, respectively, for the second day of running on Wednesday.