Ross Brawn believes Mercedes is getting better at predicting tyre behaviour

The Chinese Grand Prix-winning team has endured an inconsistent season and has at times struggled with managing the Pirelli rubber, but while Brawn accepts that the current regulations force a team to be more reactive to changing situations than in previous years, he has no doubts that the team is getting better at anticipating what will happen.

"I think it's both," he replied when asked if F1 is becoming reactive rather than predictive. "We are having to be more reactive because we are meeting situations that are very difficult to predict.

"But we are getting better at predicting what is going to happen and better at understanding what will evolve.

"Some teams seem to have been in a good position from the beginning of the season and some teams like ourselves have had to work at it and make some changes.

"So it's predictive and reactive, but we're getting better at predicting and modelling and analysing what is going on."

Brawn admitted that the team's performance in the German Grand Prix was a little disappointing, after Michael Schumacher slipped from third on the grid to seventh at the chequered flag.

Before the race, he had spoken of the effort that the team has put into trying to even out the car's performance in a range of conditions , both pertaining to the track and the fuel/tyre situation.

In Germany, he was unhappy with the pace at some, but not all, points in the race.

"It was a little bit disappointing," he told AUTOSPORT. "There was a period of the race where it was a bit flat and we couldn't get it to fall as we hoped for and other parts of the race where it was more respectable."