Jenson Button may have been fastest on the soft tyre in Barcelona on Friday but the McLaren driver was more concerned about his struggles to get the hard tyre to work.
He couldn’t get temperature into the fronts when running on primes, although his team mate Lewis Hamilton seemed to have less of an issue.
Button obviously has to use primes to get out of Q1 without resorting to options, and also for a stint in the race.
“It was a tough afternoon,” said Button. “I’m still trying to understand the tyres. The car still seems to be working well on the softer of the two tyres. But on the hard tyre I just can’t get it working, I just can’t get the temperature into the tyre. I don’t know why that is, but it’s something that we need to sort out for Sunday.
“Lewis seemed quicker on the prime than he was on the option. It’s frustrating. It’s normally the other way around, because I don’t like movement so much, so the prime would normally be a good tyre for me.
“When it works, it works well, and when it doesn’t, it’s obviously dreadful, so we’ve got to try and get it in the right area.
“My new tyre run on the soft tyre, the car felt pretty good. There are still some improvements that I feel can help us. I did a good lap time on that tyre, and if we can sort out our problems on the prime, I think we can be quite competitive this weekend.”
Button said he was very happy with the new nose and other aero updates
“The car is working well, and I think the updates do work. I think aerodynamically we have a strong car. We’ve just got to make sure the four things touching the road are working correctly, and if they are, we can show how good our car is.”
Adam Cooper F1 