This year's Formula One tyres faced extreme conditions during today's two free practice sessions for the Malaysian Grand Prix: track temperatures that peaked at 49 degrees centigrade and very abrasive asphalt. Tyre wear and thermal degradation were in line with expectations and the top seven in FP2 were covered by four-tenths of a second, setting the scene for a closely fought race.The P Zero Orange hard tyre, completely revised from last year's version, took to the track for the first time this year. The performance gap between the hard and the medium tyre, also nominated for Sepang, was between 1.0 and 1.2s today, opening up several strategy options.Only the hard tyre was used in FP1...
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