Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsMcLaren

Magnussen surprised by MP4-30 performance

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Kevin Magnussen says he was surprised by how good the McLaren MP4-30 felt on his first day in the car on Saturday.

McLaren has been beset by reliability issues throughout pre-season testing, with Jenson Button’s 101 laps on Friday by far the most it has managed in one day. Magnussen was driving the car for the first time on the penultimate day of testing and had his running curtailed by an oil leak but he says the car feels a lot further ahead in its development than he had expected.

“It felt good,” Magnussen said. “I was quite surprised with the torque delivery and upshifts and stuff like that. There’s still a way to go but I was surprised by how smooth it was and the way it worked. Honda is completely new with this type of power unit in Formula One so I was quite surprised how well they’ve done in that short time they’ve had.

“We still need the reliability to improve before the first race, which I’m sure it will, but I was pleasantly surprised how smooth it all is.”

And Magnussen says Button and Fernando Alonso - who he was driving in place of - have got a stable car to race with despite the limited mileage so far.

“I didn’t get any high fuel running, I only went half way. It’s hard to say [how it is as a race car]. The first feeling on low fuel and low fuel-ish was very good and very consistent, stable, no surprises. Last year’s car was a bit more unpredictable and it’s nice to see that the work we did last year and the direction that we wanted to go has definitely proved to be right. It feels right, and that’s nice to see.”

Full times and day three of the final test as it happened

Click here for the gallery from day three of the final test

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.