Honda talks to Verstappen: "Will ask him for more details"

Honda are reasonably satisfied with the course of the first day in Spain. In the second free practice for the Spanish Grand Prix all cars with a Japanese engine were in the top ten and that gives a lot of hope for the remainder of the weekend. Yet there are also small concerns.

"The first day was almost trouble-free on the engine side," Tanabe told AS-Web. Only Yuki Tsunoda suffered a brief power outage during his run. "That was just after he left the track for a moment, hit the kerbs hard and the underside of the floor took a beating, so we are investigating the cause and effect of that. We're going to investigate the cause of the problem thoroughly because the power shouldn't be turned off after a shock."

Red Bull will recover

Honda will be hoping to fight for pole position in Catalunya Saturday afternoon, but then Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez in the RB16B will have to bring a little more. "The two Red Bulls were a bit disappointing, but the comments from both drivers were positive. If we can bring every sector together, it's not so bad," explained the top executive.

Whereas Honda seemed to have the power unit with the most power in Bahrain, the advantage now seems to lie with Mercedes again. Verstappen noticed that as well, he said on Thursday. What is the exact situation? "Of course it depends on the characteristics of the circuit and how the regenerative energy is used. I haven't spoken to Max about this yet, so I will ask him for more details and try to analyse the data if necessary," Tanabe concluded.