McLaren racing director Eric Boullier remains confident that the team will make progress as upgrades are introduced over the next few races.
The team ended its streak of failing to score in Monaco after three frustrating weekends.
“The plan has always been the same, as I said many weeks ago,” Boullier told this writer. “It was going to suit us in Monaco and suit us in Montreal, and Austria as well because it’s a medium downforce track. The first part of our upgrade is coming in Austria, the second part at Silverstone, and it should give us a clear step to catch up a little bit. We keep working and we have many more in the pipeline coming. The target is really to be in the top eight all the time.”
Boullier said the team was pleased to be back in the points with Jenson Button’s sixth place in Monaco, although Kevin Magnussen dropped back to 10th after a technical glitch that took him two laps to resolve.
“It was the usual unpredictable Monaco racing. Let’s say we’re reasonably happy, even if it’s not the ambition of McLaren, to be back in the points. We could have finished sixth and seventh, but as usual in racing you need to pass the chequered flag. We lost the electrical power for a couple of laps, which is why cars were able to attack Kevin. It took two laps to recover, unfortunately. At this time cars were passing him, and Kimi did this very brave move!”
Boullier was pleased with Magnussen’s first F1 outing in Monaco: “To be honest Kevin did a very good weekend, except for a little mistake on the restart when he passed Vergne before the safety car line. We obviously let Vergne pass back.”
Adam Cooper's F1 Blog 
Austria and Silverstone will be huge. I would like to believe that they can improve but it’s the same story we’ve been hearing from the team for a few years now. Start off on the wrong and struggle to make up the time, except 2012 when they admitted they had no idea why their car was so quick!
People are likening their drop in form to Williams when Williams lost factory BMW support. Talk of title sponsorship falling through is also now a worry. The longer the car sports ‘Mobile 1’ or ‘SAP’ logo’s on the sidepod the more difficult I think it will get for them.
Of course, if Mclaren at Silverstone are challenging for top 4 positions many fans will be pretty satisfied. That will surely give some hope going into 2015 with an apparent exclusive engine deal.
Top 8? This is McLaren, with Mercedes engines for goodness sake, they should be in the top 4 at least.
Yes, quite. Sounds more like something you’d hear from the Sauber or Force India PR person than a key man at McLaren. Maybe Eric needs to take a good look at where his paycheck is coming from.
Ha ha… nice to hear such a statement from Team McLaren, who was always fast (history) but little less reliable when Kimi was there, he fought tooth and nail with the multiple champion. now they are talking about top 8.
Does Ron know Eric’s only aiming for top 8?
Seems very off message.
Good point, can’t you just see Eric walking down the hallowed halls of Woking, when one of Ron’s assistants meets him and says ‘Monsieur Boullier; Mr. Dennis would like to see you in his office– immediately.”