Pirelli's new ultra-soft compound will only be available on street circuits, the tyre manufacturer has confirmed.
Pirelli is set to increase its dry tyre range from four to five compounds in 2016, with purple-striped ultra-soft joining super-soft, soft, medium and hard. Two of each compound is picked per grand prix weekend, with drivers required to have at least one stint on either during a race.
The softest tyre on the current range, the super-soft, has only used in Monaco, Canada, Austria, Singapore, Russia, and Abu Dhabi and the newest addition to the Italian manufacturer's range will be used even more selectively.
"It's only for the street circuits because as we saw in Monaco and in Singapore the wear levels are very low at the moment," Pirelli Motorsport boss Hembery is quoted as saying by Motorsport.com. "Cars are sliding less and the change we made is a boost in terms of wear levels.
"Maybe too much, but with the lack of testing we're not being able to make any further changes to the product so we're living with that we have because the cars will be quicker next year. Every year they improve, so what was okay last year may be quite dramatically different next year."
Hembery has already confirmed Pirelli is hoping to engineer a sudden drop-off in performance -- also known as "the cliff" -- back into its tyres for 2016 in order to make racing more exciting.