Button: McLaren on the right path

Jenson Button believes McLaren can be satisfied with its overall performance on the opening day in Bahrain, especially given the rear tyre degradation issues all teams were facing.The Briton got the first day of his title defence off to a solid-looking start with his new McLaren team, outpacing new team-mate Lewis Hamilton in the morning session at the dusty Sakhir venue before setting the fourth-quickest time of the afternoon.Button reckons that generally the MP4-25 has looked strong so far even if he knows there are improvements to make to its set-up prior to qualifying.I think we should be reasonably happy with the performance of the car we know there are areas we need to work on, but the basic car is working well, he told reporters.But we are not quite there with the balance yet I think. There are things we wanted to really try, but you don't really get enough time when you are doing long runs.Friday's sessions marked the first time teams had run their 2010 cars in hot and humid conditions after pre-season testing had taken place in relatively cold, and often rainy, weather in Spain.With heavy fuel loads exacerbating tyre wear, Button admits the super-soft rubber on the rear of the car takes some looking after although he feels McLaren generally handled the situation quite well.Looking after the rear tyres is very, very difficult here, especially on the softer one, he said.So you are finding yourself driving with a lot of oversteer throughout most of the stint on the soft tyre.So it is pretty tricky, but I think we did an okay job today.The 30-year-old finished the afternoon session over two tenths adrift of second-placed Hamilton and said that both of his laps on lower fuel were compromised by slower cars. It was a bit frustrating on the two shorter runs that I did because I had traffic on both of them, he said.[They were] cars that were just pottering around really which is a bit frustrating but that's the way it is in practice.The thing is with having six cars that are a little bit off the pace, especially two of them - or actually only one ran in this session it is quite tricky to get a good gap to the car in front because you don't know how much fuel they are running or how much slower they are going to be.But the long runs seem to be positive. The car is going towards oversteer, but I think it is the same for everything and it's about managing that situation.Meanwhile, Hamilton was also reasonably content with the team's first day at Sakhir even if he admits he is still none the wiser as to the true pecking order.It doesn't feel too bad for the first day out, the 2008 champion said.I still don't really have an understanding on where everything else is, but on the track it is very, very hot so the degradation on both tyre compounds is pretty high.However, on the lighter to heavier fuel loads the car feels fairly similar.But it is difficult to tell where everyone is at the moment you see the positions at the moment and it doesn't really correlate too much.Some pundits have suggested that of McLaren's all-British line-up Button may be the one who finds it easier to nurse tyre wear problems over race distances given his smoother driving style.However, asked about how easy the Sakhir graining problems would be to cope with, Hamilton said he thought the situation would be manageable with tweaks to his driving style even if the team is not yet entirely sure when's best to push the tyres over a long stint.I think it is something you can handle, he said.You have to do it a little bit with your driving style, the approach to each lap.But it's difficult to know what lap time to target when you do a long run on the heavier fuel load.The less you push at the beginning, does it mean you can push more at the end It is difficult to know.So we are still trying to understand it.