Despite being content with third place in Sunday's Bahrain grand prix, Lewis Hamilton thinks a big push is required to close the gap on Ferrari and Red Bull before the Australian grand prix on March 28th.

Having started the Bahrain grand prix in fourth place, Hamilton was relegated down to fifth by Nico Rosberg on the opening lap of the race when he made a mistake at turn four.

However, McLaren played a cunning strategy to leapfrog the lead Silver Arrow in the pits, allowing Hamilton to eventually claim the final podium slot from Sebastien Vettel, who was hit by engine reliability issues late in the race.

During free practice on Friday and Saturday it became apparent that McLaren were lacking outright pace compared to Ferrari and Red Bull, making Hamilton's qualifying position and his race result all the more satisfying.

"Third place was a very strong result for us," said Hamilton.

"I feel that we did a good job: our reliability was great and the pace today was pretty good, but we still need to push very hard to close the gap to the cars in front.

"My race was decided on the first lap when I locked up at turn four, ran a bit wide, got in a bad position and Rosberg got past me.

"After that, I spent the whole first stint close behind him, but just couldn't get close enough to pass him.

"After the pit-stop, the guys were able to get me out ahead of Rosberg and I had some clear air and was able to make up quite a bit of ground to Felipe Massa."

Hamilton suffered with a vibration caused by a flat-spotted front tyre in the closing stages of the grand prix, however, he believes that if he hadn't been stuck behind Rosberg during his first stint, he would have been in a position to challenge Massa for second place.

Looking ahead to round two of the season in Melbourne, Hamilton said: "It's going to be difficult for us to close the performance gap immediately, but I think I'll go back to the factory and give them the biggest push.

"I know they're all pushing flat-out as it is, but we need to get some upgrades, and we need to bring as many of them forward as we possibly can."

Jenson Button finished seventh in his first race with McLaren, after being locked in a race-long battle with Mark Webber in the second Red Bull.