Hamilton and Kovalainen a 'dream team'

LONDON, England (CNN) -- McLaren's Lewis Hamilton and Heikki Kovalainen are getting on "fantastically," according to Martin Whitmarsh, the team's CEO.

It is a marked turned around from 2007 when Hamilton and then team-mate, Fernando Alonso, traded put downs in the media.

Whitmarsh was effusive about the pair's relationship in comments on the team's website.

"I'm delighted with the way everyone is working. Lewis and Heikki get along fantastically well and in my 19 years with the team I don't ever recall seeing such an honest exchange of information between drivers."

He was also delighted with Kovalainen's progress, saying he out paced Hamilton in Malaysia.

"Heikki did a terrific job. He and his crew developed his car's set-up to the point that he was quicker than Lewis in qualifying -- even though he had a marginally heavier fuel load. He did an excellent job in the race too.

"He was supposedly struggling for confidence last year, when people were starting to question his potential, but I'm delighted to see how hard he's worked."

Whitmarsh said they would be making some minor changes to the car for the Bahrain Grand Prix.

"We have to make sure we perform better there. We're leading both world championships, so it hasn't been too shabby a start to the year, but we need to raise our game in Bahrain and carry that through into the European season."

Toyota's Jarno Trulli was also upbeat about his team's progress.

"They have done a very good job over the winter, have given me the car to fight... the team did a great job all weekend [in Malaysia] and we deserved to be fighting at the front.

"We had a positive test over the winter in Bahrain and we know what to expect there with our car."

However, Williams' Nico Rosberg said the first two races had been an "emotional rollercoaster."

"We left Australia riding the crest of a wave: I'd just celebrated my first Formula One podium and the FW30 had proved itself to be a competitive car," he said.

"Yet, in Malaysia, we endured an uncompetitive weekend and a full analysis of why that was is currently going on at our Grove factory."

Rosberg said their biggest problem in Malaysia was the tires.

"We couldn't get Bridgestone's medium and hard compounds to generate grip on the circuit's new asphalt, despite the high track temperatures. It seems as though McLaren suffered a similar problem to us, so we weren't an isolated case," he said.

"Bridgestone are taking the same compounds to Sakhir that we used in Australia, which is good news. We also have a few developments coming on the car as well, so I can't wait for the race weekend to start." E-mail to a friend

All About Lewis Hamilton • Heikki Kovalainen • Martin Whitmarsh • Nico Rosberg • Jarno Trulli