Coulthard: McLaren Made a Step Forward

McLaren-Mercedes driver David Coulthard said the team "clearly have work to do" on their new MP4-19B challenger after its debut in the French Grand Prix at Magny-Cours on Sunday.

Coulthard said the pace of the latest machine was encouraging despite the fact he finished a disappointing sixth after starting from third on the grid with his Finnish teammate Kimi Raikkonen down in seventh having started ninth.

"Obviously it was much improved in what we have seen in previous races," said Coulthard. "We were 30 seconds down at the end but in a lot of other races this year we have been a lap down. We had two cars in the points in the last race in America but a lot of people dropped out, so we have made a step forward but today we were only good enough for sixth place.

"That is what we have to use as the building block. It is about getting the right track position and being consistent but today we weren't that consistent. I am more confident but clearly there is more work to be done."

Coulthard and Raikkonen had expected to be challenging for race wins from the start of the season but their team faded away after encouraging pre-season testing performances failed to turn into strong race results.

Raikkonen failed to finish the opening three races of the season with two engine failures and a transmission problem and also suffered problems with the engine in several pre-race practice and qualifying sessions.

The latest machine, a heavily modified version of the original MP4-19, had not completed a full race distance before the team introduced it at Magny-Cours and it showed their early season reliability issues are no longer a problem.

After helping the team claim double finishes in the last three races Coulthard is now concentrating on pace.

"There are still further developments to come so we can hope to try and keep pace as the other cars develop," he said.

McLaren have collected 17 points from the last three races while Williams-BMW, who are one place ahead of them in the Championship in fourth, have scored just one after being hampered by three disqualifications and one heavy crash.

They are still down in fifth place but they are now just 15 points behind Williams, who saw Juan Pablo Montoya finish eighth here, and are keen to continue their rise up their table in the remaining eight races of the year.