Heikki Kovalainen sure Caterham making strides with its upgrade package

Coming into the German Grand Prix weekend, the Finn complained that rain at Silverstone made it difficult to get the best out of the revised car.

But despite similar conditions at Hockenheim, he has no doubts that the team's understanding of the Caterham CT01, which has run with modified sidepods and exhausts, a new front wing, floor upgrades and a tweaked floor since Silverstone, has improved.

"We are certainly understanding it better and better all the time and confirming the feeling that I had at Silverstone that the back of the car is strong," Kovalainen told AUTOSPORT.

"It's the front of the car that we need to make work better now to balance the car. We still need to do some rebalancing but we're heading in the right direction now."

Kovalainen admitted that the mixed track conditions made it difficult to draw any conclusions.

But despite this he was pleased that the team was able to complete the work it needed to do on Friday in preparation for qualifying and the race.

"It was a tricky day to make a clear conclusion of where we are," he said. "In the morning, we were able to get the programme done that we were planning and we got a lot of data.

"Depending on when you were on the track, the laptimes were changing quite dramatically but nevertheless, we got a good feel for it. So if it rains on Saturday we are ready to go.

"But it's hard to say for sure from the driver feeling because the conditions were inconsistent."