Though McLaren have not achieved a top-three finish in the season so far, their sporting director Sam Michael is confident of a bounce back at Silverstone this weekend.
Neither Jenson Button nor Sergio Perez have made it to the top three this season. Even in the last race, the Canadian GP, both drivers walked away without scoring a single point for the team. This was the first time in 64 races that McLaren went pointless.
"It was a brutal weekend for the team," Michael told Sky Sports, "To be lapped by the top cars, that is probably the most important thing for us to concentrate on. We are still developing the car and it is responding - just not as fast as we had hoped. [However,] I think the picture of Montreal was painted blacker than what it probably is. We have made progress over the last number of races and I think, for Silverstone, our thoughts are that we will definitely be more competitive than what we were in Montreal."
"We have a lot of things which we will do in practice at Silverstone and, hopefully, they will yield even more performance out of this car," he added. "No question they will work better than they did in Montreal [but], in terms of taking a big step up to the front, that is probably unrealistic and we just have to try and take small steps each time."
With just a few days to go for the eighth race, the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, Michael insists that there is still time for a turnaround. "I don't think you ever get to a point where you write it off [completely]," he suggested. "We will always be pushing to improve the car and get good results right to the end. [However,] in terms of bringing development parts to the car, the August shutdown is going to be a natural point for most teams to start ramping down this year and putting everything into 2014."
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