Lewis Hamilton believes a constant evolution of Red Bull's car since 2009 has been the key to its success over recent years.
In 2009 the FIA dramatically altered the regulations regarding car design and Red Bull instantly built one of the fastest cars on the grid. The main performance aid that year was the controversial double diffuser, which Red Bull did not start the season with, but when it added it, the car was the fastest in the field.
Since then Red Bull's cars have built on its success, taking both titles last year and dominating the start of this season. According to Hamilton, over the same three-year period McLaren has scrapped two cars after a very unsuccessful year in 2009 and a number of issues in 2010.
"They [Red Bull] have had a car since 2009 that's almost been the same car, it's just evolved," he told journalists at Spa-Francorchamps on Thursday. "In that same design it's just evolved, so it's got better and better and better. We had a terrible car in 2009 and we scrapped that car. We built a new car in 2010 and we scrapped that car. We built a new car in 2011 and I think we're going to have a similar car for next year so it should be closer.
"Whether or not other teams will do that [I don't know], but their [Red Bull's] car will probably be another evolution of this year's car again - until the rules change drastically again and who knows when that will happen."
He added: "They started with a car a few years ago that has evolved and it's very difficult to catch that up if you keep starting again. I may be wrong, but I have no doubts that they will be very strong next season. We've shown that we are competitive and we've got the strength to power through at certain points of the year, but we just want to bring that closer to the front."
McLaren's 2011 season got off to a terrible start when reliability issues plagued its testing schedule, but since then it has gradually improved and the MP4-26 has won four races. Hamilton is confident that McLaren will be closer to Red Bull at the start of next season, albeit not on the same pace straight away.
"We can definitely at least half the gap, and instead of it being half a season [to catch up] it could be a quarter or a few races."
He also admitted that McLaren has become too dependent on its exhaust-blown diffuser for downforce and that it would have to increase the overall downforce before next year when the FIA will effectively outlaw the technology.
"I think if we all took our exhausts away you would see the Red Bull remain at the top and the others lose a lot more," Hamilton said. "Talking about the fundamentals of my car, it's not as if I'm massively happy with it. I think as a team we know that we need to improve it and that's what we're working on. We're working on the basic downforce rather than what's coming out of the exhaust."
Meanwhile, Red Bull's Mark Webber is confident his technical director Adrian Newey will keep coming up with innovative ideas.
"McLaren have done what they've done, we're doing what we're doing," he said. "We've had an incredibly successful recipe over the last few years. A lot of the time Adrian [Newey] is not even looking at the results, he's still just looking at performance and how we can make things better.
"So irrespective of guys closing in on us, and it being tight or competitive or whatever, Adrian is not working by reacting and saying we've got to try this and we've got to try that. When you get nailed fair and square obviously it might narrow the focus a bit more to say 'actually, how are they doing it?'
"There are a lot of things to look at these days. The cars, as ever, are very, very technical."
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