Honda to hold 'motivational' meeting

In a similar situation to Australia three weeks ago, Button qualified strongly at Imola only to disappear in the race, having to settle for a distant seventh position.

In Melbourne he started from pole position and then dropped down the order in the race before retiring while in sixth place.

Button said the team will hold a meeting at their factory tomorrow to discuss their problems.

"It is motivational really," said Button of the meeting. "So they know I am still very positive and I am not going to sit back and say, 'it doesn't matter anymore, we cannot win races.' I am still pushing and that is why I am going in to tell them that.

"It will be a sort of motivational speech because I am sure everyone needs it. Hopefully it will make the difference.

"The car has the pace, and in qualifying I know we were running low fuel - but compared to the Renaults, they stopped on lap 24-25, if you take that into account we would have done a similar level in qualifying.

"The pace is there on one lap, it is just getting it right in the race. We have got good pace in the race as well - not as good as the Renault, not as good as Michael, but it is pretty good.

"It is good enough to be up there, fighting for a podium, but we are not even getting that result because we are making mistakes, and we have got to resolve that issue because that is what is costing us a lot of points this season.

"It is not something that we are shying away from. We know we have issues, and everyone in the team is working hard to try and solve that."

Button, who lost all chances of a strong result following a pitstop blunder, said the team must stop making mistakes if they are to fight at the top.

"It will be an interesting meeting with the whole team, and hopefully we can clear things up," the Briton added.

"They are a team that work hard, and they will give everything to work it out. We just need to make fewer mistakes, but it is not from being slack or not trying hard enough, definitely not.

"I did everything I possibly could, I was driving every lap like a qualifying lap, and it is tough around here to do that. It is difficult to be consistent, but a couple of mistakes like that cost you three points.

"It is disappointing, and we have got to make sure that we don't have issues like that again. We won't be getting podiums and we won't be challenging for the wins if we are doing the same thing."

Button, however, is still confident that Honda will catch up to the front runners this season, saying the team will be introducing some improvements in the next race.

"There will be improvements, and we have to see if they are good enough," he added. "We cannot say we are going to be quicker than [Renault] at the next race, we don't know.

"We have a three-day test and hopefully we can improve the car to catch them up or get close to them at least."

Honda's disastrous day was completed by Rubens Barrichello finishing in 10th position, having started from third.