Honda believes it: a podium is the goal for 2015

Honda has not yet abandoned the prospect of being able to get on the podium in 2015. There is great anticipation around the McLaren circles in anticipation of the Spanish Grand Prix: in addition to the possible change of livery, which however has not been confirmed, the technicians from Woking, at Montmelò, should bring substantial updates capable of making the MP4-30 take a clear step forward. Since the inaugural race in Melbourne, the English car has made significant improvements, so much so that in Bahrain, during qualifying, Alonso managed to get through to Q2, an unexpected result until a few races earlier.

“Day after day we see progress and I am convinced that all this effort will bring to results before the end of the season,” commented Yasuhisa Arai, head of the Honda F1 project to his Finnish colleagues at Turun Sanomat. But you can't forget how reliability is still a weak point of the MP4-30: in Bahrain itself, if the Spaniard was able to rejoice for the step forward in qualifying, Jenson Button was the protagonist of a weekend dismayed by technical problems, so much so that he was forced not to take not even taking part in the race: “We worked hard for the first European race and I can say that, even if we are not where we perhaps would have liked, we are making notable progress steps forward – continued Arai – Being able to get on the podium at least once is our goal for the season, we are still behind but we have found the right path to continue on”.

When asked whether the new era of Formula 1, consisting of a hybrid engine, it complicated the return to the Honda Circus, the Japanese wanted to make a clarification: “I wouldn't say that it complicated it, but that it diversified it – he commented – It's important for Honda to change the working methodology and that's what we're doing."

Eleonora Ottonello
@lapisinha