Drivers warn McLaren to fix backwards slide

Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button winced late on Sunday whilst maintaining the ’win together, lose together’ mantra after yet another bad weekend for McLaren.

"We still came away with some points but we need to react fast," British newspapers quoted Hamilton as saying after getting a bad start and finishing in the train behind winner Mark Webber.

"The team have definitely got some work to do because we are falling behind race by race," he said.

The 2008 world champion has been much happier than in his calamitous campaign last year, but he is at risk of growing frustrated that he has not been among F1’s record six different winners so far in 2012.

"I just don’t understand why the two guys next to me and the guy behind me got perfect starts. I don’t know what my team was up to there.

"And I don’t know how long my pitstop was but I lost quite a lot of time," said Hamilton.

He also complained publicly about not being told on the radio to push a bit harder to keep Sebastian Vettel behind him in the round of pitstops.

"You should have kept me updated," he moaned into the radio.

Hamilton then told reporters: "I didn’t have the information to say ’Sebastian is going to get you’. I could easily have pushed."

"We haven’t had a grand prix weekend where something hasn’t gone wrong," he sighed.

Faring even worse in qualifying, the races and subsequently in the championship recently has been teammate Jenson Button, who has gone backwards since winning the Melbourne season opener.

"It’s my leanest period since the old Honda days, but s**t happens," he said late on Sunday.

Button’s race ended when he crashed in frustration with Caterham’s Heikki Kovalainen.

"We were so far behind getting points that I couldn’t wait for the race to be over. At least I didn’t have to do the last eight laps.

"That’s one way of looking at it so I didn’t need to feel pain for even longer," said the 2009 world champion.