Max Verstappen insists he is not concerned about the number of Honda engine penalties that Toro Rosso has incurred so far this season.
The Japanese manufacturer is enjoying a less eventful year than those with McLaren as the performance and reliability prove much better than at any point during their tenuous partnership.
It is that upward path which led to Red Bull agreeing to take on the Honda engine from 2019, however, despite the gains, Pierre Gasly has used five of the three main components, internal combustion engine, turbocharger and ERS with Brendon Hartley on a sixth ICE, twice his permitted allocation.
“I don’t think they have had a lot of issues,” the Dutchman was quoted by F1i.com. “Most of the time, maybe they had a bad qualifying so then it doesn’t really make a lot of difference for them to take a new component, so that’s what they are doing.
“I’m not too worried and they still have quite a few races coming up to understand the package, and for next year it’s going to be a new engine, it’s different.
“They learn from their mistakes, which is good. It’s happening on other brands, not only Honda. So, I’m not too worried.”
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- Red Bull: Honda partnership has more potential than with Renault
For Verstappen, the situation can’t get much worse after he was furious with Red Bull’s current engine supplier Renault following the Hungarian Grand Prix as another failure led to his retirement just five laps into the race in Budapest.
