Force India deputy team principal Bob Fernley says McLaren and Toro Rosso are the teams he is most keeping an eye on as threats for fifth place in the constructors' championship this season.
A strong start to the year has seen Force India secure fifth in the standings after the opening seven races, with the team ten points clear of Toro Rosso and 18 ahead of McLaren. However, Fernando Alonso has reached Q3 on the last three occasions as McLaren has started to show real signs of improvement, though it failed to score in Canada.
Asked about the progress of McLaren so far this season, Fernley told F1i: "They’re doing a good job, yeah.
"I think they’ve got a little way to go. From a performance point of view there’s probably not in it from the chassis but I think we’ve got the better engine at the moment and it will get tougher as they improve. And you would expect it to be so.”
However, Fernley sees Toro Rosso as the bigger threat despite the power unit deficit of using a year-old Ferrari engine.
“I think Toro Rosso are still the ones we need to watch. With the Ferrari that’s still not a bad power unit and they’ve got a good chassis. I think we've got to keep an eye on Toro Rosso, that’s the threat from behind. But equally we would like to see ourselves closing a little bit on Williams. But we need a couple of good results for that.”
And despite Valtteri Bottas scoring a podium in Canada, Fernley is not giving up hope of challenging Williams for fourth in the constructors'.
“I think let’s wait. Once you get through Silverstone and a little bit beyond, that’s the time to look at where they are and where we are. The most important thing is that we’re holding fifth, we’re slightly edging away from Toro Rosso and that’s a good position to be in.
“Whether the push this year is capable of bringing Williams in or whether we get a better opportunity next year, that’s always got to be our goal because obviously they are the independent team that is in front of us. So we need to somehow or other reel them in.”
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