Ilmor focus on improving handling

The team feel that they are losing the majority of their time through corners rather than in a straight line, so they have been trying to develop the frame of the bike ahead of the new season.

"The engine isn't bad, but we lose a lot of time in the turns, both on entry and exit," Illien was quoted as saying by Italian magazine Motosprint.

Illien believes that the team are not doing anything particularly wrong, but they are just struggling because of their lack of experience in bike racing.

"We are behind because our package is at its debut," he said. "We have a new chassis and frame, and we lack experience.

"Therefore we are unable to predict what happens when we make a modification. Everything has to be verified on the track."

However, Illien believes that the team are heading in the right direction, and he knows that they have to be patient.

"We are on the right track, we have good engineers, but we lack experience," he said. "Here you don't take leaps forwards, progress is one step at a time."