Although Jenson Button believes that McLaren-Honda will have gained some performance since the season opener in Melbourne, he still believes it will not be enough and is expecting to run at the back during the Malaysian Grand Prix.
Speaking to Sky at Sepang, Button said, “I think we will have a good gain in performance, but still I think we will be right at the back and I am not sure we will be able to race anyone.”
“We were a long way behind in Melbourne, so even if we have a reasonably big gain I think we will still be at the back, but hopefully a lot closer. We just need to keep seeing these big steps forward at every race.”
“The temperature is tough and we have a lot of things that should help with that. Overheating was a bit of an issue for us with certain areas of the power unit and we will see what happens here,” explained the 2009 world champion.
“It is two weeks and you have a good understanding of what the car is doing in the heat of 18c in Melbourne and you can play around with it and add cooling and fans in certain areas that you think are necessary.”
“For us, it was always going to be difficult. In winter testing we only did 12 laps so to get stable temperatures in 12 laps is very difficult so maybe in the race we were cooler than expected, but it is too late then,” concluded Button who will start his 270th grand prix on Sunday in Malaysia.