Button suspects car problem

McLaren had not been on Red Bull's pace this weekend as its eagerly-awaited exhaust-blown diffuser did not pay off in practice and was removed late last night, but Button said he still expected much better than a seventh row spot.

"This morning the car felt really good," Button insisted. "I personally think there is something wrong - the car was undriveable this afternoon as soon as I jumped in it.

"I took so much front end out of it, five or six turns, which is 1.5 per cent, which is just wrong. We had this problem on Friday where we kept having to take front wing off to get the balance."

He said the problem was definitely something more than just the car's balance changing with the overnight change of specification.

"It hasn't got the blown diffuser, but this weekend it's been tricky for us - but that wasn't normal," Button said.

"This morning the car felt reasonably good, we have a new front wing which is working really well, but something felt very wrong then. I was getting on with the car this morning even if we didn't have much experience with the new setting."

Button added that postponing the full introduction of the new exhaust system was definitely the right move in his opinion - despite today's result.

"For now, there is a lot of work that needs doing on the upgrades to improve them," he said. "It would not have been right to run them here, so it was the right decision."