Button making rookie mistakes on F1 return

Jenson Button admits he is making errors that a beginner in Formula 1 would make on his return to race for McLaren in the Monaco Grand Prix.

• BUXTON: The Future's Orange

Fernando Alonso's decision to race in the Indy 500 this year saw Button called up to replace the Spaniard in Monaco, marking his first grand prix appearance since the end of 2016. Despite not testing this year's McLaren before first practice, Button was within 0.1s of teammate Stoffel Vandoorne by the end of Thursday's running, but the Briton says he is making rookie mistakes.

"I'm braking for corners and I just feel like I'm going to be in the barriers," Button said. "It's strange, initially, but I'm definitely getting to grips with it. At high speed it's so much fun. So much fun. The first part of the Swimming Pool is flat. I can't remember the last time it was flat, it probably has never been for me. That's great.

"Turn 3's a lot of fun as well, heading into Casino, but there are braking areas where there's a lot of work still to do to get confidence to brake hard.

"It's the old beginners thing in Formula 1 where you brake early, you lift off early, you turn in, you accelerate too early and you understeer off. There's a lot to come and hopefully I can sort myself out on Saturday morning after I've been through all the data."

Admitting he had "a little giggle" to himself when leaving the pits at the start of Thursday's running, Button says he quickly felt at home in the wider 2017 car.

"FP1, as soon as I exited the pits, everything felt very natural. The weirdest thing is probably when you let a car past or you're behind a car, because you look at the size of it and it's gigantic. Then you feel really uncomfortable because then you think maybe I am too close to the barriers.

"It fits well, it fits like a glove the car. FP2 was a little bit trickier as I've said to really find my feet, braking so much later than what I'm used to here and carrying so much speed into the corners. It's just having that confidence because normally you would lock up a tyre braking that late or you'd be in the wall. It takes time. But hopefully with another day off, a bit of time with the engineers, I can improve myself."

And the 2009 world champion insists he isn't setting any targets despite finishing FP2 in 12th place and seeing the potential to improve on Saturday.

"To be fair, I haven't really thought about where I would hope to finish. It's a very mixed up grid at the moment so I'm sure it's all going to change on Saturday. I don't expect to be one-tenth off a Mercedes in qualifying. The guys, they understand where I am coming from with my feelings. They know what we have to do to improve the car to suit me a bit more and give me confidence. Hopefully we'll see a good step in performance."