'We didn't develop MP4-25 quickly enough'

Martin Whitmarsh

McLaren has admitted that they made a "few mistakes" and didn’t' develop the MP4-25 quickly enough this year.

McLaren team principal Martin Whitmarsh admits mistakes and a failure to develop their car quickly enough cost them dearly.

"You have to keep developing your car, you have to keep making it go quicker and you have to not make mistakes," he told Autosport.

"We have had a few mistakes and we have not developed the car quickly enough. But we will keep pushing and we will see what we can do at the next race.

"We have won Championships, we know what it takes and this year, Ferrari have had a fantastic second half to the season as well, so it has been three great teams fighting it out."

Despite Hamilton's fears that it would take a "miracle" to win the title, Whitmarsh believes it only takes one or two mistakes from the other contenders.

"Drivers and cars not finishing races are not miracles, they happen quite frequently in motor racing, so we will see," he said.

"At the moment if Lewis wins and Fernando doesn't finish, and there are not many points scored by the other boys then he wins. There is a tense Championship fight going on at the moment.

"It is fantastic for F1 that we are going to the last round and four drivers could potentially come out of it as World Champion. You have to say at the moment that Fernando looks very strong but we have seen things go wrong in the last minute in Championships ourselves.

"Sometimes it has been against us, sometimes in our favor – you just have to keep pushing and anything can happen. That is the nature of motor racing."