Button aiming to bounce back after Canada

Probably no one one in the F1 paddock is more in need of a morale-boosting race next weekend at Valencia than Jenson Button, who sank to 16th place during a dire outing in Montreal for the former world champion that even saw him lapped by the race winner - his own McLaren team mate, Lewis Hamilton.

"I'm confused and very lost," Button said after the Canadian Grand Prix. "I just didn't have any pace and couldn't look after the tyres. I'm not two seconds slower than Lewis. I don't know what's going on."

Now he is seeking to put such thoughts behind him as he looks ahead to next weekend's race at Valencia - a track that McLaren have yet to win at.

"Valencia is a track I really enjoy; I've already won on a street circuit this year [in Australia] so I'm definitely optimistic about having a great weekend and picking up the momentum again in the title fight," he said.

"The last few races haven't delivered the results I'd like, but there are still 13 races to go," he pointed out. "We've had seven different winners and no clear championship leader has emerged, so I'll be looking to get a decent result under my belt next weekend in order to get my title bid back on track."

Has the intervening seven days allowed him to shed any more light on his problems at Montreal last weekend?

"Canada was just one of those weekends where things didn't come together," he said. "I really needed the track time on Friday to find a clearer direction with the set-up, and, unfortunately, that didn't happen due to a number of technical issues.

"That set the tone for the rest of the weekend: we lacked the data we needed to tackle the race and we struggled. Still, there were important lessons to be learned from those issues.

"We addressed everything back at McLaren Technology Centre once we'd returned from Canada in a bid to get a clearer direction for Valencia next weekend," he added. "A day like that is enormously productive and I think we covered a lot of ground."

Next weekend will show whether Button and McLaren have indeed managed to get on top of the problems besetting their driver and are close to returning him to the race-winning form he showed at the start of 2012.