Button: “Race ruined by the team's wrong weather forecast”

Jenson Button said he was convinced that McLaren ruined its race by banking on a new downpour of rain that never arrived. When the first safety car came in, Mercedes put intermediate tires on Button and Kevin Magnussen's cars while the rest of the field opted for slick tires as the track was drying. At the restart Button briefly found himself in the lead but had to come back for soft tires when it became clear that the team's weather forecast was wrong.

The Englishman then finished the race in tenth place: “Evidently we use a different weather radar from everyone else, because rain was forecast on the team's radar” declared Button. “I did everything right in the race and it's hard when you give your all. Fifth place on the grid was our position and I think I put the car in the right place in the race but they threw everything away."

Magnussen returned to the track after the break in fifth position and at the end of the race he finished in 12th position but admitted that he had chosen the intermediates independently: “It was my choice to stay with the intermediates. The team always relies on the rider in these situations and I made the wrong decision, the team didn't make a mistake. The team can only tell what the radar says. They are not gods, they cannot control the weather. I know we took a risk waiting for more rain, but I thought it was worth it. I don't think things would have been much different with a different strategy, but we need to sit down with the engineers and strategists to discuss it."