Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button will both miss the Pirelli tyre tests scheduled for the 19th and 20th of November, after the Abu Dhabi GP.
The move by the McLaren team is odd, given that almost every other top team will use one of their current drivers for the test. In Red Bull’s case, Sebastian Vettel will cover both days, as will Robert Kubica for Renault. Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa will share duties, as will Michael Schumacher and Nico Rosberg.
McLaren will instead opt to run test driver Gary Paffett on the Friday with junior driver Oliver Turvey ending the tests on Saturday.
Button said the decision was purely a team decision.
“I wanted to do the test but the team said, ‘we don’t think it is really the best time for you to be testing the tyre because it is going to change a lot.’ And that is not through driver comment,” said the 2009 world champion.
“It is just the tyre will change a lot before we can properly do some serious testing with the new car, and get useful information from a race drivers’ point of view.”
