Button: Strong start key to challenge Red Bull

Jenson Button insists McLaren must have a better pre-season if they are to challenge Red Bull from the off, something they couldn’t manage in 2011.

The Woking outfit endured a difficult pre-season last year when they delivered their MP4-26 to the second test, only to discover a highly complicated exhaust system was extremely unreliable.

That left the team little time to correct the problems before the first race in Australia and meant they were on the back-foot in terms of development.

This is something Button hopes to avoid: “We have to start the new season stronger, this is something we must do. Let’s make things more difficult for them [Red Bull].

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“Our weakness last year was the winter and we must work to prevent this from happening again.”

Whilst the team emerged as the second quickest in Australia, they remained in such a position for much of the season, managing to win just six races, half what Red Bull won.

“We are still not fast enough,” added Button. “But we were their closest rivals and beat them on occasion. So we can beat them, but they still have a bit more pace and that’s what we will fight to find in the winter.”

The 31-year-old, who moved to McLaren for the 2010 season has impressed massively, and believes the still relatively new partnership will take another step forward in 2012.

“It’s a great foundation and I think the team should be pleased that our partnership is still very new. I think we will take a good step forward for 2012.

“I feel we have a great car. It was often difficult to fight the Red Bull, but when we beat them it was even more special because we know how competitive they were.”