Experimental data from the Mega Amp Spherical Tokamak (MAST) is used to show that the inverse gradient scale length of the ion temperature R/L-Ti has its strongest local correlation with the rotational shear and the pitch angle of the magnetic field. Furthermore, R/L-Ti is found to be inversely correlated with the gyro-Bohm-normalized local turbulent heat flux estimated from the density fluctuation level measured using a 2D beam emission spectroscopy diagnostic. These results can be explained in terms of the conjecture that the turbulent system adjusts to keep R/L-Ti close to a certain critical value (marginal for the excitation of turbulence) determined by local equilibrium parameters (although not necessarily by linear stability).