Di Resta eyes points boost on return to Barcelona

"I love coming to Barcelona," said Di Resta. "It's a track I know very well, having tested here for four days earlier this season.

"This weekend we're coming here with a number of significant upgrades to the car which we believe will deliver the goods. I wouldn't put any numbers on it, but we are hoping it's going to be a fairly big margin here.

"I suppose the degree of improvement depends on what the rest of the grid have done, but we've not been too far away from making it to Q3 in the last race. We're hopeful our upgrade is bigger than what they have."

Di Resta, though, admitted his team has yet to decide whether it will introduce all the new parts — which include a new aero package with new wings as well as a blown floor — this weekend.

"I'm fairly reserved in that matter because at the end of the day we won't know until we get on track," he said. "We are going into it with an open mind.

"We've seen many teams trying many different things and not racing them. But I'm sure the team will do a professional job and make sure that we put what we think is the best race car on track."

While Di Resta will be aiming to get back into the points for the first time since the second grand prix of the year in Malaysia, current world champ Sebastian Vettel is hoping to further increase his lead in the championship.

The Red Bull ace, who has won three of the opening grands prix and leads the McLaren of his nearest rival Lewis Hamilton by 34 points, finished third at the Circuit de Catalunya behind his team-mate Mark Webber 12 months ago.

Sandwiched between the two Red Bulls was the Ferrari of Fernando Alonso and yesterday the double world champ committed his future to the Maranello team until 2016.

"I'm very happy with this. Ferrari feels to me like a second family," he said.