Honda bringing further developments to PU? 'We learn from every session'

Prior to the third free practice and qualifying session of the Portuguese Grand Prix , Toyoharu Tanabe, Technical Director at Honda, looks ahead to the developments still to be made for both this season and the year after, when the Honda engine project will be officially handed over to Red Bull.

In conversation with Formula1.com Tanabe gives his take on the current strength of the Honda power unit relative to that of the rest of the grid. Improvements to the power unit have ensured that Red Bull can compete with Mercedes for the title this year. Tanabe: "The competitiveness is still hard, but we made a step forward during the winter season and so far, across the two races we had this season, things look good for our performance."

"But we keep pushing to achieve our goal," states the technical director. That goal? Winning the constructors' title during their farewell year in Formula 1.

"The PU and chassis are working pretty well," Tanabe continues. "We learn from every single session, and make optimizations to achieve a total performance improvement. It’s a little hard to predict which improvements we can achieve."

No major concerns for 2022

Asked about the state of the 2022 power unit, Tanabe assures that at Honda everything is going according to schedule. "The 2022 PU must comply with the regulations, so in that area we are working for next year. It’s on schedule, so we don’t have any big concerns", the technical director concluded.