McLaren chief Zak Brown has denied the team ceased development on its 2018 Formula 1 car after the Spanish Grand Prix in May, claiming it💯 c♕ontinued to work on updates for the MCL33 until October.

McLaren saw its recent poor form continue in 2018 as the team failed to finish a race any higher than fifth – scored at the opening round of the yಞear in Australia – leaving it sixth ཧin the constructors’ championship.

The team found it had fundamental design issues with its 2018 💟chassis, the MCL33, as it struggled to compete with the other Renault-powered teams🌊.

Explaining the team’s poor form at Suzuka in October, McLaren driv🌜er Fernando Alonso said: “I think we constantly see nꦫew parts to the midfield guys every weekend, because we see their cars, we see the pictures.

“We see always updates to e𒁃veryone, and from probablꦡy Spain, we don’t have any.”

While McLaren Racing CEO Brown described the team’s season as “very disappointing,” he moved to clear up suggestions the team had given up on the MCL33 car early, saying in Abu✱ Dhabi that development had continued through to ꦯthe United States Grand Prix October.

“We obviously built a very🌜 poor race car that has not responded much to the development we’ve put on the car,” Brown ⛎said.

“We developed the car all the ꦿway up until the U.S. Grand Prix, so some ofꦕ the reports that we stopped in Spain were very inaccurate.

“But I think some of the development in the seco🍒nd half of the year was about learning for next year’s car.

“I’m confident the team is ꦑworking hard together, well together, and we’ve obviously made changes to understand and identify where we’ve made mistakes and looking not to repeat those going into next yea♎r.”

McLaren’s difficult 🌳2018 season came despite its switch to a Renault engine supply after three years working with Honda, where a lack of performance and reliability from the power unit was often cited as the reason behind the team’s struggles.

Brown said the switch had helped McLaren properly recognise w🦋here its issues lay, having been given the opportunity to measure itself against other teams running the Renault power unit.

“We had challenges those three years and so i🦩t’s harder to understand when you’ve got different variables that aren’t performing, where are the areas of w🐎eakness,” Brown said.

“When you get yourself in the situation where you have a clear 🀅marker where Red Bull is, you can take that out of the equation and there’s fewer places to look.

“I think in that sense, it helps that there were two other teams we could💫 directly measure ourselves against, and we fell short performing against eith⭕er of them.

“So that did help."