Alonso says updates not a revolution

Ferrari is bringing several new components to Istanbul, hoping to close the gap to Red Bull after a disappointing start to the season.

While Alonso is sure the upgrades will work, he reckons they will not be enough to make a big leap in performance.

"It is going to improve the car, we have some new parts here and we will have new parts in the next few races," said Alonso on Thursday.

"It is an improvement from what we had in China but it is a couple of tenths. It is not a revolution and will not change the car completely in one race.

"I expect a slow reaction, step by step to try and close the gap. We are happy with our work in the last three weeks in improving the car but we also think the others teams did improvements in the last three weeks.

"Maybe we will see not tomorrow but in qualifying if we close the gap a little bit and that will be a huge motivation for all of us if we are a little bit closer here."

He added: "Obviously there is some disappointment with the results in the first few races. We were hoping for much better after winter testing but there is no time to be frustrated or no time to go down.

"We need to work even harder to recover from this and the team is fully committed to do this and I am sure that we will recover very soon and here in Turkey hopefully we see the first positive signs."

The Spaniard also claims his team still has plenty of time to react, having recovered from a similar situation last year.

"Last season we lost points at the beginning and then we recovered in the last part and we were close in the fight for the championship," he said.

"This year we are losing points, we are aware now of the distance to the leaders but obviously it is much earlier in the championship now and last year we started recovering points after Silverstone, race 11 or 12. Now we are in race four so there is plenty of time, but as you said we are losing points and we need a reaction as soon as possible."