Fernando Alonso believes McLaren will not show an obvious improvement in terms of results until Singapore at the earliest.
The double world champion scored his first point of the season at the British Grand Prix, with Honda finally improving reliability after two races when both drivers failed to finish. With Honda confident of making clear steps forward in the second half of the season, Alonso says he is willing to be patient.
"I think we need to remain calm because we are so far back that even if we make big improvements it will not be so obvious in terms of results, in terms of how competitive we can be," Alonso said. "Definitely it can only get better because we are at the back of the grid and we need to improve the whole package.
"On the power unit side there is a lot of room to improve, on the aerodynamic side there is room to improve, mechanical side, reliability … We’ve been facing a lot of problems, not only in the races but also in the free practice, so there are a lot of things we need to put in place.
"I think we are moving in the right direction – it’s not always so obvious when we make improvements because from 17th we are 16th or 15th. But hopefully in the second half of the season … at least after Spa and Monza - which will be quite difficult for us with their characteristics - so from Singapore onwards we can see something more clear in terms of results."
While the Hungaroring should suit McLaren, Alonso says the team will be using the weekend to learn about the potential of its car overall.
"It’s an interesting weekend for all of us – it’s a circuit with completely different characteristics from Silverstone, Canada, [Austria]. This will put us in a good test because we will know how competitive we can be on a circuit with a low power effect.
"It’s interesting to see how the weekend goes, obviously we have a new engine we can take without a penalty so we will put it in the car and try to extend the mileage a little bit because we were quite limited. It’s a weekend that we need to get some answers, not only on the competitive side but in practice to try and maximise the performance."
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