Grosjean slams Pirelli's Chinese GP tyre pressures as 'undriveable'

Grosjean was in good company as McLaren's Jenson Button suggested the cars were "floating around", particularly with the pressures rising with heat getting into the rubber.

Grosjean, who has so far finished sixth and fifth in Australia and Bahrain as Haas has made a strong start to its debut campaign, fears he could be in for a tough weekend in China.

"The tyre pressure limit has been ridiculous, everything is up to the roof and the cars are undriveable," said Grosjean.

"Out of the garage the front-tyre pressure is 23psi, which is absolutely ridiculous, with the rear 21 and a half.

"So imagine on track we are 26 at the front, hot, and 23 at the rear. It's almost a road car. You just don't get any feeling.

"With pressures that high you get locking brakes, understeer. It's like there is oil on the track.

"You could see a lot of people locking the wheels for no reason. It's the same for everyone, but it looks like we are suffering a bit more.

"It would be good if we could change a little because it doesn't feel like a racing car."

Button was equally as critical.

"The minimum pressures we can run are massively high so the tyres overheat pretty much immediately," he said.

"It's a pretty big issue, especially on the longer runs. It's just trying to find your best way of getting around that, which we're not doing a very good job of."

Asked about potential solutions, he replied: "I don't think there's anything you can do about it now.

"They've risen a lot over the last year. I think they were 19 or something last year, or 18, last year and they've gone up by 4psi, which is massive, that's before you leave the pits, before they increase through the roof.

"It's tricky and that's probably why you see the cars floating around a lot more. They're not stuck to the road and you can't carry speed."

In response, Pirelli motorsport boss Paul Hembery said: "Traction was certainly at a premium, it's true to say.

"We're conducting our post-race briefing, so we'll know where we are after that.

"The process is on a Friday we take the data, the telemetry from the teams and we compare that to the pre-race simulations, then we verify if the prescriptions we have are correct."

Autosport understands air temperatures were 10 degrees centigrade higher this year compared to Friday practice at the track last season.

In that respect, it is also believed certain teams have done a better job in terms of cooling their tyres compared to others, and why only some drivers are complaining.