McLaren’s early promise flattered to deceive in China, as Jenson Button slumped to a 13th place finish having run as high as fourth in the first half of the Grand Prix.
The 2009 World Champion took advantage of the first corner mayhem to jump ahead of both Ferraris, among others, and the Brit also felt that he had the pace to keep his rivals behind.
“My start was good: I made up a lot of places and was able to take the battle to the other cars. Our pace on the Option tyre during the first stint was also pretty good – it was fun racing the quicker cars.”
The McLaren driver pitted under the fourth lap Safety Car, which came out as a result of Daniel Ricciardo’s high-speed puncture, and switched onto the medium compound tyre, a move which the 35-year-old later lamented.
“When the Safety Car came out, there was mayhem in the pit-lane because Nico [Hulkenberg] was trying to slow everyone down to help his team-mate. After that stop, we seemed to be sitting in a strong position, but we were running the Medium compound, and we just seemed to stand still compared with the others.”
Button continued to run the Medium tyre, finding himself outside of the points with a matter of laps to go and decided to roll the dice, changing to the Super-soft compound for the final 10 laps. However, the 15-time Grand Prix winner ultimately came home two places down on his starting position.
“We tried to do a two-stopper – which didn’t work out – so then we decided to fit the Option for the final stint. Given our position just outside the points, we thought we might as well give it a go.
“Perhaps fitting the Option at the end was the wrong choice – I could have stayed out until the end on the Medium, but I decided to have some fun by fitting softer [ie, faster] rubber – but it just couldn’t make its performance last to the end. Still, as I say, it was worth having a crack at it.”
