McLaren admits win not likely until 2010

Sunday, 21 June 2009 17:09

Martin Whitmarsh has conceded McLaren is unlikely to be back winning races until next season after its cars raced towards back of the field during a dismal home British Grand Prix.


Having qualified in 13th and 19th places, the team expected a tough 60-lap race and that’s how it panned out with Lewis Hamilton and Heikki Kovalainen engaged in an afternoon of entertaining, if ultimately fruitless, dices with similarly struggling rivals BMW and Renault.


Whitmarsh acknowledged it had been a miserable Silverstone weekend for the team, but promised that it would continue pushing development on its current MP4-24, alongside work on next year's car, in a bid to finally find a breakthrough.





However, he admits the team can't currently realistically expect to turn the car into a race winner over the final nine races.


“This weekend has been a very difficult one for everyone at McLaren,” he said.


“No-one in our team likes not winning, and it goes without saying that we all remain utterly determined to return to our winning ways.


“That may not be a realistic prospect for this season – although significant improvements are in the pipeline – but the team is doing a huge amount of work in an effort to gain a full understanding of the performance issues our car is currently facing, with a view to developing next year’s car as well as improving this year’s car.


“Sometimes you have to go backwards before you can begin going forwards – and, painful as it was for all of us, this weekend was an example of that.”


Hamilton, who described the MP4-24 as “dead slow” after qualifying a career-worst 19th, initially moved up to 15th by the end of the first lap before claiming another place from BMW’s Robert Kubica, only to lose it again after being forced wide at Chapel Curve.


Thereafter he gave his home fans something to cheer with bold overtaking moves on Nick Heidfeld’s BMW at Maggotts and former team-mate Fernando Alonso’s Renault down the inside of Copse, but his race-long struggle for grip eventually saw him spin at Vale and wind up 16th.


“I gave it my all today,” the reigning champion said after his fourth successive point-less race.


“Despite fighting for the lower positions, I was absolutely on the limit for the whole race.


“We knew it would be difficult, and I enjoyed my battle with Fernando, but we didn’t have the pace today to get into the points.


“The best thing about this weekend has been the fans: they really gave me some consolation by cheering me on throughout the race.


“I would love to have given them a result to make them happy and my country proud, but we still have a lot of work ahead of us before that will be realistic.”


Heikki Kovalainen slipped behind Hamilton at the start after being boxed in by other cars though Copse, before eventually retiring after colliding with Sebastien Bourdais’s Toro Rosso on the approach to Vale following his one pit stop.