McLaren hoping straight fight with Red Bull racing team in Monaco – Formula 1 news
Recent reports have revealed that the McLaren team is hoping a straight fight with Red Bull Racing in the upcoming Monaco Grand Prix taking place on May 29, 2011.
Other than Red Bull, McLaren fear that other strong teams would be more competitive in next race weekend, as they have shown unexpected results in the Spanish Grand Prix.
Although Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel are way ahead of other drivers, but McLaren boss Martin Whitmarsh thinks that strong contenders like Mercedes GP and Ferrari can deliver more on the Monaco race circuit.
He said, “Armco always beckons at Monaco, but we have a great record there and would like to do it again. We have won it 14 times; we would like to win it again. I think Red Bull do a number of things to set-up their car for qualifying, which makes it very
quick. We are working on some of those areas.”
The McLaren boss discussed Ferrari as well as Mercedes GP performance in Spanish Grand Prix. He added that Fernando Alonso did quite a good job in the qualifying round and then, retained his progress in the Sunday race. In addition, Mercedes’ driver Michael
Schumacher made an impressive run in Barcelona race following his disappointing start to the 2011 season.
However, Whitmarsh judged that both teams, Ferrari and Mercedes will give a surprising performance in Monaco after a positive Spanish Grand Prix.
He also believed that McLaren drivers made a progress with an upgraded package in Spain. However, he thinks the team still needs to do more to lift itself in front of its current competitor.
Whitmarsh went on to mention, “We certainly put over half a second on the car. We will do a full evaluation when we get back, but we need another half second. And we will keep working until we get that.”
After a very close fight with RBR in the ending laps of the Spanish GP, the Woking-based outfit is hopeful Monaco race will turn into a straight head-to-head fight between McLaren and Red Bull drivers.
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