Honda is not feeling more pressure to deliver despite having the higher expectations of Red Bull this season.
After splitting from McLaren at the end of 2017, the Japanese manufacturer made significant progress with new partner Toro Rosso last year and impressed the senior team enough for them to switch from Renault
As a result, it means Honda now has a realistic chance of winning in Formula 1 for the first since time 2006 but technical director Toyoharu Tanabe insists that doesn’t change their approach.
“Of course, we respect the Red Bull results over the past few years and of course there is pressure, but we want to supply high performance, which is always our target, so there is not much change,” he said at pre-season testing in Spain.
“Once we participate in a race as Honda, not only in F1 but all racing, winning is our aim, our target but at this stage, it is very hard to tell what will happen this year.
“Our target for both teams will be to improve and we want to get better results than last year for both teams.”
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So far the new partnership has got off to a strong start both with reliability and performance, areas Tanabe believes Honda has made gains in over the winter.
Indeed, it has raised rhetoric even higher from Red Bull chiefs who believe they may sit second in the initial pecking order, ahead of Mercedes.
“We are fully on schedule. The car works as we predicted, and the Honda engine is a rocket,” team boss Christian Horner added.
“Pierre Gasly told us that the engine is better than last year’s and Max is raving about it. He feels much more power.”
That led to the Briton concluding it was “clearly better” than Renault, although the French manufacturer has performed well over the first three-and-a-half days so far in Spain.
