No quick fix for tyre issues, says Fry

Although Button was able to put the RA106 on pole, major difficulties getting heat into his Michelin tyres effectively ruined his afternoon, as a lack of grip meant he slumped to fifth place before his Honda engine blew up coming out of the final corner.

Fry said: "The problem was the inability to get heat into the tyres - especially the front tyre. When there are not so many safety cars then that is obviously not such an issue, but with so many safety cars it was.

"Every time the safety car was about to go in, he had trouble getting around the final corner onto the straight, which meant he was slow there.

"People could get alongside him and pass him on the straight, and the tyres were pretty cold when he went into the first corner, so he lost one or two places every time that happened. And as there were so many safety cars, that was obviously a huge disadvantage to him."

Although sources have suggested that Honda Racing went against the advice of tyre supplier Michelin in their tyre choice for the Albert Park race, Fry has insisted that the root cause of the problem has more to do with the characteristics of their car than what specification of rubber they chose.

"It is a car issue," he explained. "We did choose a slightly different tyre, but I don't think really that this was the issue at all. It is a car issue.

"We are very light on tyres, and we tend to run fairly low tyre temperatures anyway. And obviously when the tyre cools down we have a problem getting heat back into them.

"So it is a problem we have got, but it is a problem that was hugely exacerbated by the circumstances of today."

When asked by autosport.com about whether the problem was easy to resolve before the San Marino Grand Prix, Fry said: "It is quite difficult to understand why.

"It is not something that is completely new to us, and obviously it is a problem that was exacerbated by the situation today.

"Hopefully there aren't many safety cars at Imola. I think these were extraordinary circumstances, and for Imola we've got two weeks of testing before then, where maybe we can find something.

"We've got a whole host of other improvements for Imola. It is a circuit where we went well at last year, and generally we are pretty good at, and we go there hopeful."

Fry admitted, however, that it appeared Renault's advantage at the front of the field was greater than he believed after Malaysia.

"What we saw last time around was about three tenths of a second. I haven't looked at the data from Melbourne yet, but it looked like more in these conditions."