King chasing F1 2017 step despite "disappointing" GP2 season

King, 22, insists his chance to join the F1 grid for 2017 is "as good as any", but concedes that the competition is stiff.

"I want to make it to F1, so I'll do whatever it takes to get there," King told Motorsport.com.

"My chance is as good as any, but there are six or seven drivers going for two or three seats. The deadline only comes when all the seats are taken."

King finished seventh overall in his second season in GP2, winning back-to-back sprint races at the Red Bull Ring and Silverstone.

The Briton dubbed his campaign as "quite disappointing" and said: "We've had podiums and wins but we've not managed to put the whole season together. Looking back, we could easily have been fighting for the championship but we made too many mistakes along the way.

"The goal was to always to challenge for the title, and mid-season we were looking strong. After Silverstone I was only 13 points off the lead and it was all still to play for. But as the year went on, the consistency wasn't there."

King, who ran with the Russian Time and MP Motorsport teams in the GP2 post-season test, does not rule out returning to the series in 2017 - but is wary of the potential drawbacks of another campaign.

"I think I still have more to prove," he said. "I've won races, so I've proved what I'm capable of, but I think there is more to prove in terms of the whole championship.

"It was a bit annoying to only finish the year seventh, but if you stay for another year and make the same mistakes again, it can harm you.

"So I don't know what I'll do next year. My goal has always been to be in F1, but motorsport often isn't as easy as it looks and there's a lot more to it than just being the best driver.

"If doing a good job was all you needed to do, there would be 50 drivers in F1. But there are only 22."

Aston Martin "an option at some point"

King took part in the FIA World Endurance Championship post-season rookie test at Bahrain earlier in November, having been called up by Aston Martin.

"Aston asked me if I wanted to do the test, so of course I said yes," King explained. "It's a nice car to drive, a different side of motorsport that I hadn't tried before.

"It's definitely an option for me at some point, but not where I want to put my energy just at the moment."

Interview by Oleg Karpov