However, the 21-year-old added that it was too early to tell what the tyre would be like in race conditions from the limited time he’s had to try them in testing this week in Barcelona.

“It is a tyre which is one of the fastest compounds and in certain circumstances it will be good, like street circuits,” he commented.

“It is a soft tyre, good grip,” he added. “It is normal and has a similar behaviour to the super-softs but nothing much different. It will be a step forward at street circuits.

“It was interesting to try it for the first time but there is nothing else I can tell you.”

Overall, despite enjoying himself by being back in the car this week, the Russian driver still wished he had more track time available to him before the start of the 2016 season in Australia next month.

“I’ve had two good test days even though I would have liked to have done more laps. There is two more test days so I will try to extract the maximum amount from them.

“I will try to personalise the car a little bit more and figure out where we can make more steps forward and develop the car for the first race.

“Even at the first race we will continue to understand the car and continue to improve the performance.”