Exclusive Q&A: Ron Dennis on McLaren's hopes for 2016 and Fernando Alonso's future

Martin Brundle: I imagine you're looking forward to the end of the season?
Ron Dennis: "We're looking forward to next season and this is the last race of this. But we've learnt a lot of the course of the year, not least from this race - the car's particularly good here; still obviously lacking, but not in grip anyway. So we're quite optimistic about next year."

Martin Brundle: Can you sort the problems out and if so how quickly?
Ron Dennis: "Of course. We've been working on next year's engine for some time now and the question is how long before you freeze it and start optimising reliability. But we'll have the performance and we'll take a pretty big step up the grid at the first grand prix."

Martin Brundle: And will that pacify Fernando Alonso? Do you want him in the car - does he want to be in it?
Ron Dennis: "Fernando's in the car next year. He told everybody yesterday. Somebody asked me whether it was feasible he could have a sabbatical year and I said anything's feasible; we talk about it being one of the options but the same journalist forgets that I said at the end of it 'but Fernando and Jenson are driving next year'.

"So off goes the story when in reality I made it explicitly clear yesterday, as I am now, that the two drivers for next year are Jenson and Fernando."

Martin Brundle: How is the team financially? You're ninth in the championship and tens of millions down…
Ron Dennis: "We're a very strong organisation. Our equity value is over £1bn, all our companies are profitable; McLaren Technology Group will return to profitability this year, so we're very solid. We've gained sponsors, we've had several long extensions - Hilton Hotels for example - we won a great contract from Hennessy Moet, contracts that are worth multiples more to the team than contracts that we lost. People move on, it's sad but it's Formula 1."

Martin Brundle: I heard you were pretty feisty at the F1 Commission meeting, that you had a go at Donald Mackenzie, one of the owners of F1, and you had a go at Christian Horner I believe. You told him to 'suck it up'?
Ron Dennis: "Those were the words. Some of what Christian has been experiencing at the moment is self-inflicted. He's obviously been lobbying hard, as you would expect him to, along different paths to achieve a better position for him and the Red Bull team.

"I understand that, but the real issue is what the teams have to do to make the future of grand prix racing better and we all have, as do the manufacturers in F1, a very strong desire  to try and address some of the issues.

"Everybody has to come to the party and that particular comment about Donald Mackenzie at CVC…after that comment, he was very complimentary about what I said and even how I said it.

"Everybody's got to come to the party. They make a great deal of money from motor racing and they need to put a bit more back into the sport at critical moments - and the critical moment is keeping Renault and keeping the Red Bull team supplied with engines. It's as simple as that.

"Without question, everybody was complimentary about my contribution to that meeting. So I don't feel at all bad about it."