'It's important to sort out the correlation issues', says McLaren's Neale

McLaren Managing Director, Jonathan Neale, has emphasised that his team’s focus is on the rectification of their flaws rather than concentrating on improving their car for the short term.

McLaren have had a terrible start to their season and are using the Spanish Grand Prix as a platform to announce their return to the top of the sport. The team has been working hard on trying to find what’s scuppered their season.

“We are essentially trying to sort out a correlation issue. It’s really important that we sort out the issues with the car and the correlation.

“All of the time you’ve got that lingering doubt of ‘hang on a second, what went went wrong, where did it go wrong and how do we fix it?’, you’ve got the opportunity for it to arise again,” he said.

Earlier in the week, McLaren driver, Jenson Button, said he was sceptical about Mclaren’s chances of massive improvement after the introduction of upgrades planned for Spain. Neale seconds these thoughts and believes the team remains realistic.

“There’s good reason why both Jenson and I would want to be relatively low key.

“None of us wants to be a hostage to fortune and setting ourselves up for a blow on the chin from [the media] isn’t very funny,” he said.

“The other thing is we’re not working in isolation here, and while of course it’s very natural that people want us to predict that we’re going to be on pole position, it’s a tough sport and the competitors don’t stand still. Quite what will be delivered depends on what everybody else will be doing.

“It’s impossible to predict and unwise to try to do so,” he concluded.