Formula 1 overtaking slumps by 20 percent in 2015

During the 19 races that comprised the past season, Pirelli says there were a total of 509 overtaking moves, with the Malaysian Grand Prix having the highest number at 60 passes.

This year's overtaking figures pale in comparison to last season's, however, when a total of 636 passes were executed in the same amount of races.

That amounts for a 20 percent decrease from 2014 to 2015.

Toro Rosso's rookie Max Verstappen was the king of overtaking during the past season, with a total of 49 on-track passes.

Not surprisingly, the least overtaken drivers of 2015 were Mercedes duo Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg, passed on track just three times each.

Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel put on one of the most impressive performances of the year in Canada, where he overtook 13 rivals to top the charts for most passes in a single race.

Fewer pitstops

Pirelli also revealed a decrease of 14 percent in the amount of pitstops made during the 2015 season compared to the previous year: 706 versus 817 in 2014.

While last year, the average number of pitstops per race for a driver was 2.02, it dropped to 1.88 in 2015.

The total amount of pitstops per race also dropped from 43 in 2014 to 37.1 in 2015.

A total of 17,580 tyres were used during 2015, 2,448 less than the previous year.

"This was an evolutionary year, with the teams continuing to develop cars introduced to meet the new turbo hybrid regulations," said Pirelli boss Paul Hembery.

"As always, the development curve accelerated towards the end of the year, with the teams really getting on top of the cars and the tyres.

"Nonetheless, we still hit our target of between one to two pit stops per race, during a season where tyres continued to provide plenty of sporting and strategic interest."