The Sauber F1 Team are unconcerned with the criticisms that have gone the way of Honda from the McLaren F1 Team in recent weeks, with Zak Brown having stated he had ‘serious concerns’ about their ability to develop their engine into something reliable and competitive.
Sauber will switch from Ferrari to Honda power in 2018, but Team Principal Monisha Kaltenborn insists she is confident that their new engine supplier has everything they need to come good, with their project with Honda completely separate to that at McLaren.
“We are not getting into that situation there, we have our own,” said Kaltenborn to Motorsport.com. “We will have our own project with them [Honda]. I have no reason to doubt that, because from what we have seen, we are confident they will get their act together.
“They have the people, they have all the tools you need to do that and we still at least have some time. We all don’t even know what is going to happen in this race, so how do we know what will happen at the first test in 2018?”
With McLaren apparently considering their future with Honda, Kaltenborn says she has no preference whether they stay or go, with the Sauber project a completely separate entity, although she imagines that from Honda’s point of view, having two teams to gather data from would be better than one.
“We have no preference because it doesn’t really affect us,” said Kaltenborn. “They are two projects and there is not going to be any joint development there or anything like that.
“It is like now with Haas, with Ferrari and us. If there was another team or not, it doesn’t really affect us. When we entered into this, there were going to be two customers and we are going to be one of them.
“It is more, I would imagine, from Honda’s perspective. The more you have, the more mileage you can get, the more data you can get, the better it is for your development.”
