• Chinese Grand Prix

Kovalainen expects Caterham improvement in China

Heikki Kovalainen: "I think we're going to show a better performance and a better race this weekend" © Sutton Images

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• Race:
• Chinese Grand Prix

• Drivers:
• Heikki Kovalainen

• Teams:
• Caterham

Heikki Kovalainen expects Caterham to be more competitive during this weekend's Chinese Grand Prix.

After team principal Tony Fernandes targeted joining the midfield runners and scoring a point this season it has been a disappointing opening two races for Caterham as it has yet to even look like challenging for a place in Q2 and currently has a best race finish of 16th place. Kovalainen, however, told Sky Sports News that he felt the team was improving and expects to see a "better performance" at Shanghai.

"It's been an unusual start to the season in many ways," Kovalainen said. "If you look at the whole championship then the championship order itself is already a bit unusual. But certainly for us it's a little bit disappointing we didn't finish the race in Australia with both cars but actually in Malaysia we showed better pace and we know the areas that we still need to work on and we're working on them. We've just got to keep patience, keep the focus 100% and then bit by bit improve the situation. I think we're going to show a better performance and a better race this weekend."

Kovalainen added that the upgrades Caterham was bringing to China would hopefully add up to a quarter of a second improvement.

"We have simulations and obviously the numbers from the wind tunnel so we know pretty well what to expect. Obviously we've still got to test it on track to make sure it works like we want it to work, but hopefully it's another two, two and a half tenths better performance in the car and then we just carry on with the setup work and make sure that the reliability stays as it was in Malaysia a couple of weeks ago."

© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.