Photo: McLaren.
Began the pre-season 2016 and resolved one of the big questions that I had. Not in what position will be the McLaren, but if the car had come out healthy, or repeated illnesses of the past. And you can say that, for the moment, it seems that they have found the cure. The new MP4-31 suffered, in the first part of the first day of the tests, a problem with one of the sensors, but in the end it turned out to be a mild cough that did not stop the work of the rest of the day. Jenson Button ended up with the sixth best time, but the remarkable thing is the number of turns that could give: 83. Not counting Mercedes (which was exhibited giving 155), the team british fell a few laps Sauber (88), Red Bull (86) and above the rest of rivals (including Ferrari).
therefore, the conclusions that he pulled out Button were positive, and it did in a day the most laps that he and his companion Alonso throughout the first week of testing from the previous year in Jerez: “We are in a much better position than last year, which is great. Everything ran smoothly, no problems with reliability, so that is not bad“. The 2009 champion knows that the speed displayed might not be the best, as it managed to be sixth thanks to the soft tyres that four of the five rivals who exceeded not used, but will diminish the importance of: “it Is too early to know whether we are fast or not. But now it is more important to understand a lot of things out of the car, that are all improvements over last year”.
Button pointed to the ERS as a positive point: “For the races we will win a significant amount of time. I am very pleased with the progress in that area. Some need more work, but this area represents a definite improvement”.
Eric Boullier, positive
For his part, the director of McLaren, Eric Boullier, commented in the same line as your pilot: “we’re definitely better. All the numbers were consistent with what we expected. That means our tools are working correctly, and that means that we know that the car is better than last year. I’m not going to say how much better, because it may produce wrong expectations and did not know where the others are, but the data agree, and that is good”. After a difficult year, the French wanted to recognize the work of its partner Honda: “they Have made great improvements. It is apparent that they are on the right track and have fixed some problems in the past year“. Finally, he wanted to relativize the optimism: “To be honest, you’re never 100% happy, so we must always improve, and each time you approach the limit do you find things improve. But we are correctamente”.
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