McLaren have decided not to run their blown diffuser at the British Grand Prix this weekend at Silverstone, after a tricky practice session on Friday which saw many off-track excursions and poor lap times from both Lewis Hamilton and his teammate Jenson Button.

The reigning world champion Button said:

“Today’s been a little bit trickier than expected in the car.

“First of all I couldn’t get a set-up for the car with the new package, but it improved at the end of the day, but there’s still a lot of work we need to do. We are not where we’d like to be. The car is very tricky in a few places around the circuit.

“We’ve definitely made some improvements in certain places, but we don’t have the right balance yet. I haven’t had a perfect day today, which is disappointing because even on a Friday it’s good to see so many people out there.”

Jenson Button

McLaren had high hopes for the updates, thinking that it would help them challenge Red Bull and maintain their lead at the top of the championship. However, earlier this week their managing director Jonathan Neale played down the importance of the new diffuser, saying:

“In Formula 1 it’s rare that there are golden bullets that will suddenly transform your car from something that is uncompetitive to competitive.

“We more than most in the last year found that to be the case, it was just a straightforward hard work and effort.

“I don’t think that putting a blown diffuser on a car is going to transform it, not perhaps in the way that the shadow diffusers were able to.”

Jonathan Neale

McLaren mechanics spent the night installing the Valencia-spec diffuser, although they will keep the rest of their new updates, including the front wing on the MP4-25, with the Woking-based outfit are hoping to have the exhaust blown diffuser back for the German Grand Prix.