Giancarlo Fisichella has made Germany's Adrian Sutil raise his game since they became Force India team mates this season, according to the Formula One team's principal Colin Kolles.
"When we signed Giancarlo we knew he would push Adrian to his limits and this is exactly what has happened," Kolles said in a preview for Sunday's Hungarian Grand Prix.
"Adrian needed a good benchmark to develop his potential and now he has one he's pushing himself a lot harder."
Italian veteran Fisichella, a race winner with former team Renault, was comfortably quicker in the early races of the season but the highly-rated Sutil, 25, has had the better results of late.
The German went through last season without being pushed by any of a series of stopgap team mates at what was then struggling Spyker.
Force India have yet to score a point in 10 races this season but came close in Monaco where Sutil ran in fourth place until he was shunted out by Ferrari's Kimi Raikkonen in the closing stages.
The team had been due to give their new seamless shift gearbox its race debut in Hungary but technical head Mike Gascoyne said that would now have to wait until the European Grand Prix in Valencia in August.
"Obviously we would like to introduce it as soon as possible," he said. "We do however need to accrue more mileage before racing it."
"As both [the old] gearboxes are three races into their four race cycle, we will use it [the new one] on the Friday [in Hungary free practice] but we'll race the standard box with the view to introducing the seamless version in Valencia."
Under Formula One rules, gearboxes must last four races in succession with any unscheduled change incurring a five place penalty on the starting grid.
