Pirelli latest P Zero: the ‘harder wearing’ Nero GT

Pirelli has introduced the latest addition to its P Zero family: the new Pirelli P Zero Nero GT. Available in a wide range of fitments, the new ultra high performance tyre was introduced for 2013. The tyre’s headline improvement is increased durability, which Pirelli says it has achieved without affecting driving pleasure, safety and performance. Also underlining the importance of the high performance segment to Pirelli is May 2013’s 50th anniversary celebration of its partnership with Lamborghini.

Taking the current P Zero Nero as a starting point, Pirelli’s engineers report adjustments to the materials, tread pattern, contact patch and sizes available in producing the new tyre. The renewed range benefits from improved stability, road holding, and dry braking. Pirelli says that it has also achieved consistency in driving comfort and noise levels throughout the tyre’s life. The company says the P Zero Nero GT is an example of how the brand continues to evolve alongside the “huge advances made in the automotive industry with bigger and better supercars and increasingly higher-powered vehicles.”

In addition to the wide range of existing homologations, the P Zero has recently been approved as original equipment for the new Porsche 911. It performs well in wet conditions with improved safety in potential aquaplaning situations as a result of its new nano-composite compound that increases grip and stability. Pirelli says the “highest evolution” in its P Zero range is the P Zero Corsa System. It has a directional tread pattern on the front axle and an asymmetric pattern for the rear, designed for both road and track with an innovative racing tread compound.

50 years of Lamborghini

Pirelli celebrates the 50th anniversary of its partnership with Lamborghini this year. In 1963 Ferruccio Lamborghini asked Pirelli to equip the newly-created constructor’s first car, the 350 GTV, which launched as a prototype at the Turin Motor Show the same year. Pirelli technology and safety remain integral to Lamborghini’s present models: the new Aventador LP 700-4 Roadster uses a bespoke P Zero tyre and the Veneno, a dream car created to celebrate Lamborghini’s 50th birthday, is fitted with specially-developed Pirelli tyres that carry a distinctive red logo inspired by the P Zero Formula One tyres.

The Pirelli Foundation in Milan hosted the opening event in Lamborghini’s half-century celebrations, which will conclude at Lamborghini’s headquarters in Sant’Agata, taking in Forte dei Marmi, Rome and Bologna. Pirelli says this choice shows recognition for an all-encompassing collaboration across one of the most important periods of technical and cultural automotive history. 

Both this model and the production version, badged 350 GT, which was presented at the Geneva Motor Show the following year used Pirelli’s Cinturato HS tyre: developed at the time to equip sports cars that were already capable of reaching the 240km/h mark. The HS designation stood for ‘high speed’, indicating the tyre’s capability of withstanding the sustained high speeds generated by the emerging supercars of the 1960s.

In 1966 Lamborghini came of age, introducing the Miura, whose tyres were added to Pirelli’s range in 1967 together with original equipment for the Lamborghini 350 GT and 400 GT. The latest models were fitted with Cinturato HS CN72, in 205VR15 size. Pirelli responded to Lamborghini’s request for a revised ‘series 70’ tyre later with a much lower sidewall to improve road-holding, to which the response was the Cinturato CN73 in 225/70VR15, which paved the way for the low profile tyre that would be marketed as the Pirelli P7. This was to be fitted to the Countach, whose ‘Anniversary’ edition was among the first supercars to use the new Pirelli P Zero family of tyres.

Fitments on Lamborghini’s LM002 4×4 saw the creation of the Scorpion range, which used Kevlar in the structure of the carcass. The LM002’s participation in the 1988 Paris-Dakar Rally marked the beginning of Pirelli and Lamborghini in motorsport; the tyre maker is presently the exclusive supplier of the Super Trofeo Lamborghini Blancpain.

Lamborghini’s Murcielago (2002) and Gallardo (2003) both used P Zero Rossos, while the partnership’s marketing implications are summed up by the Lamborghini Diablo’s presence in Pirelli’s ‘Mission Zero’ film in 2007, starring Uma Thurman. This marketing synergy dates back to the Miura’s appearance in a 1970 advert for Pirelli original equipment, whose tagline was: “The Miura chose Pirelli Cinturato.”