• Spanish Grand Prix

Button looking to increase pressure

Jenson Button has called on McLaren to add pace to its car © Sutton Images

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• Race:
• Spanish Grand Prix

• Championship:
• FIA Formula One World Championship

• Drivers:
• Jenson Button

• Teams:
• McLaren

Jenson Button has said that McLaren needs to increase the pressure on Red Bull if it wants to challenge for race victories.

After signs of revival in China - where Lewis Hamilton won from Sebastian Vettel - it was Vettel who was victorious in Turkey while McLaren slipped off the pace. The main reasoning was a lack of updates on the car due to reliability issues, and Button said the team would have to avoid a repeat of those problems this weekend in Spain.

"We can't stand still, we have to move forward," Button told Press Association Sport. "This team will never give up, I know that, and I have every faith they will bring some good improvements to Barcelona. Definitely the Red Bulls are quick and they have a lot of points on the board, but it can all turn around very quickly as soon as you put them under pressure. So we have to make sure that sooner rather than later we start doing that."

McLaren was struggling during pre-season testing with a car that appeared to be about two seconds off the pace, until a last-minute adaption of the rear end made it much more competitive in Australia. As the teams return to Barcelona where a lot of testing took place, Button says McLaren must forget about how far it has come and focus on closing the gap.

"We were in a bad place before the year started, but you have to forget about what happened in the winter and start with what happened at the first race and move from there. We're all doing our best to improve the car, but we didn't put anything on it over the weekend in Turkey.

"Hopefully we'll turn up in Barcelona and we'll have more pace. That is what we need, to get more stuff on the car as quick as we can. It's something we're obviously aiming for and hopefully we'll make some changes in other areas as well that will help us and we'll be fighting the cars in front of us, not just the Red Bulls.

"Obviously everyone is doing as good a job as they can, but you always want more. Every race you go to you need to improve the car, and we didn't do that in Turkey because the best of our two cars was fourth."

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