Breaking news
Formula 1
Honda believes it can be "proud" of 2017 engine progress
Outgoing Honda F1 chief Yusuke Hasegawa says the Japanese manufacturer can be "proud" of its engine development rate during the 2017 Formula 1 season.
Lawrence Barretto
Edited: Dec 21, 2017, 2:35 PM
Copy link
Share on Viber
Honda opted to change its F1 engine concept over the winter, but ran out of time to be sufficiently prepared for the season.
It suffered a series of failures and, in a bid to save its relationship with McLaren, aggressively introduced performance developments at the expense of reliability.
While McLaren decided to switch to Renault engines for 2018, by the end of the year, it was able to fight consistently for points with Honda.
"Our performance improvement level is something to be proud of," Hasegawa told Motorsport.com before the news broke that he would leave his role as head of Honda's F1 project at the end of the year and instead work on road car projects.
"Our competition level was lower than expected so we needed to update more often. We needed to sacrifice time checking reliability to get the updates to the track. It was strategic.
"We are confident we can confirm the reliability, This is just a time issue. We prioritised the performance update over checking reliability."
Hasegawa admitted Honda's reliability in 2017 was "not acceptable" and is an area it needs to focus on over the winter.
Honda struggled with correlation in the first half of the season, with reliability progress achieved on the dynos not being replicated on track.
"It's very bad that we have had failures on the track and on the dyno," he said.
"Reliability, we had a clear target, which is we have to be able to complete five races with one engine but we haven't achieved that. It's a clear point. We are very disappointed."
We want your opinion!
What would you like to see on Motorsport.com?
Take our 5 minute survey.
- The Motorsport.com Team
Read and post comments
Read also :
Share Or Save This Story
Copy link
Share on Viber
Previous article Ferrari F2004 to appear at 2018 Autosport International Show
Next article Massa was a "great reference" for Williams - Lowe
Top Comments
There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?
View More & Comment
More from
Lawrence Barretto
Sirotkin, Stroll to have two race engineers each
Formula 1
Formula 1
Sirotkin, Stroll to have two race engineers each
Hamilton "sacrifice" saved Mercedes an hour of testing
Formula 1
Formula 1
Hamilton "sacrifice" saved Mercedes an hour of testing
Kubica regrets being "too honest" about driving limitations
Formula 1
Formula 1
Kubica regrets being "too honest" about driving limitations
More from
McLaren
The six drivers doing double duty in Portimao GTWCE and Barcelona WEC this weekend
WEC
WEC
Barcelona
The six drivers doing double duty in Portimao GTWCE and Barcelona WEC this weekend
Why McLaren cannot fix its F1 car handling until 2027
Formula 1
Formula 1
Singapore GP
Why McLaren cannot fix its F1 car handling until 2027
Latest news
GTA VI 'Vice City' blimp to appear at NASCAR championship weekend
NASCAR Cup
NAS NASCAR Cup
Phoenix II
1 h
GTA VI 'Vice City' blimp to appear at NASCAR championship weekend
Verstappen Racing struggles to 15th as Porsche takes emotional Portimao pole
GT World Challenge Europe Endurance
WCEE GT World Challenge Europe Endurance 2 h
Verstappen Racing struggles to 15th as Porsche takes emotional Portimao pole
Franco Colapinto urges fans to stop the abuse: “You’re not helping me or my future”
Formula 1
F1 Formula 1
Singapore GP
6 h
Franco Colapinto urges fans to stop the abuse: “You’re not helping me or my future”
Gresini: New MotoGP rules won't increase gap between factory and satellite teams
MotoGP
MGP MotoGP
Indonesian GP
7 h
Gresini: New MotoGP rules won't increase gap between factory and satellite teams
Feature
Discover prime content
Subscribe and access Motorsport.com with your ad-blocker.
From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.
You have 2 options:
- Become a subscriber.
- Disable your adblocker.
Subscribe now Already subscribed? Sign in here
Already disabled your adblocker?
Reload page
Manage Alerts
Subscribe