PREVIEW: McLaren look to close gap on Ferrari and Red Bull

Jul 29, 2010, 9:38 GMT

Budapest - McLaren head into this weekend's Hungarian Grand Prix in Budapest looking to close the performance gap on Red Bull and Ferrari and keep their dual championship challenge on track.

Ferrari's Fernando Alonso controversially won last Sunday's German Grand Prix at Hockenheim ahead of teammate Felipe Massa and Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel to reignite his title hopes.

McLaren still top the constructors' standings and Lewis Hamilton leads the drivers' championships from teammate Jenson Button but the team is bound to be concerned as the German GP was the first race since Monaco in May where if failed to seal a podium finish.

Hamilton finished fourth and now has 157 points with eight races remaining. Defending champion Button came home one place further back and has 143 points, followed closely by Red Bull drivers Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel on 136.

Alonso's second victory of the season sees the Spaniard move on to 123 points in fifth. McLaren have tried to introduce their version of the exhaust-blown diffuser used by their two main challengers and the British-based team had an upgrade at Hockenheim.

'Were learning more and more about the blown floor after every session, and I feel like we got some very useful data from Sundays race in Germany,' said Button.

'Now its all about maximising our package and hopefully securing a strong result before the summer break - that would be a massive positive for everybody on the team.'

McLarens engineering director Paddy Lowe admitted that his team are a couple of races behind Ferrari in the introduction of the blown diffuser, which increases downforce, and half a season behind Red Bull.

'But we did reach a point in Hockenheim of being able to race a working system which was both giving us performance and was reliable,' he added.

Massa, meanwhile, returns to the scene of the accident which nearly cost him his life last year. The Brazilian required emergency surgery after his skull was fractured by a metal spring during the 2009 Hungarian GP.

'My first meeting when I arrive at the Hungaroring circuit will be with all the marshals and medical staff who did such a very good job of carefully getting me out of the cockpit,' said Massa.

Alonso, meanwhile, will be hoping to build on his success of last weekend.

We knew full before Hockenheim that our car was much more competitive and that was what made me so confident. Now we must continue in this direction, starting this coming weekend in Budapest,' said the Spaniard.

'I have already said it many times before: there is still a long way to go in the championship.'