Hamilton happy with fourth

Sakhir - Defending champion Lewis Hamilton said he was delighted to finish fourth in Sunday's Bahrain Grand Prix, but warned that it will be tougher for him and his team in future.

The 24-year-old Englishman delivered his strongest performance of the year so far for McLaren-Mercedes after starting fifth on the grid.

Afterwards, he said: "I'm delighted with fourth. It was tough. The Toyotas, Red Bulls and Brawns were so fast in the high-speed corners that it was just impossible to keep up.

"But this is another encouraging step for the team. We just need to keep working on the car because we're not really fighting back quite yet, but we are collecting points.

"And the gap will be bigger when we go to Barcelona because it's a high-downforce circuit. We should challenge for the top 10 there, but another top five will be harder."

His McLaren team-mate Heikki Kovalainen had another day to forget after finishing 12th.

He admitted he made a mistake by starting with the harder tyre compound.

"My start was a disaster," said the Finn. "Obviously, to begin the race on the prime tyre was the wrong choice.

"The harder tyres didn't have the right grip and soon started to deteriorate. The tyres started vibrating even though there wasn't a flat-spot.

"After my first pit-stop the car felt much better, but by then it was too late to improve dramatically. Anyway, the pace was not very good.

"We now need to go away and analyse why our performance was not good enough today. We'll be working even harder to improve it ahead of the next race in Barcelona."

Asked about the championship, Hamilton refused to throw in the towel although he is a long way behind compatriot Jenson Button after only four races.

"Let's see what happens, there is a long way to go," he said.