- First Barcelona Test - Day Three
Button: McLaren winter 'looks worse than it is'
Jenson Button thinks McLaren's situation looks worse than it really is because Honda is at the stage its rivals were at this time last year in terms of experience.
McLaren suffered another setback on Saturday as a seal that was intended to solve an earlier issue with a faulty MGU-K component failed in the morning. It limited Button to just 24 laps - bringing the team's total from Barcelona to just 109 so far - as McLaren lost another vital day to get to grips with its new power unit.
The other three manufacturers all have an extra year of experience in the V6 turbo era than Honda and Button thinks this unfairly magnifies McLaren's lack of laps.
"It would be a very situation if this was last year," Button said. "I don't think we'd be here asking the same questions because everyone, well most people, would be in the same position. Everyone else out there has much more experience with these power units whereas Honda obviously doesn't so it looks worse than it is. I would love to be pounding round every day we drive the car but it just isn't the case right now. There are problems we need to solve that we will solve and hope that the next text will be a good test for us in terms of mileage."
Despite the frustrating lack of laps Button says there is plenty to be optimistic about, even if he is concerned about his own lack of mileage with the MP4-30.
"I haven't really driven this car in anger yet. I did one new tyre run this morning which was cut short and I did one on Thursday morning at 10 o'clock, and that was it. It's been a tough test for me personally. In terms of information yesterday was good. We gained a lot of information in terms of the direction of the car and set-up which is great.
"This afternoon I wasn't able to do any timed laps because we had the problems again this morning, so the afternoon was basically data gathering, aero work, starts and pit stops, which are things we could do which is good. The starts worked very well, which was great to see as they're the first starts we've done. There were some positives in terms of moving forward for Melbourne but not in terms of me getting laps under my belt."
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