McLaren still planning to bring more upgrades for 2019

The Woking-based team is hoping to end the year as best-of-the-rest behind the big three outfits, and is currently 34 points ahead of nearest challenger Renault in fourth place in the constructors' championship.

While the team knows that it needs to invest as much of its resources as possible into its 2020 challenger, boss Andreas Seidl is clear that it will not ease off in its bid to keep improving its current challenger.

"As we have seen in the last three or four races, we now clearly have the fourth strongest car and I think we have everything in our hands to secure this P4 at the end of the season," he said.

"That would be a great achievement as a team. But at the same point it is important to stay flat out for next year's car to make the next step.

"So we still keep improving the car, and keep understanding the car better and better. In Japan it was really working well and we will still bring some small bits to the next races. However, the majority of the team is flat out on the 2020 car."

While McLaren's early part of the season was helped by its race execution rather than the out-and-out pace of the car, progress it has made in unleashing more pace from its MCL-34 has left it upbeat about where it stacks up against the opposition.

Seidl added: "It is encouraging. I think we simply get better and better as a team and with the car.

"That means the understanding we got from the car and the performance of the car, by bringing continuously small little bits. We are in a happy place."