All four Honda-powered drivers finished inside the top eight during Sunday’s Monaco Grand Prix, much to the delight of Honda F1 Technical Director Toyoharu Tanabe.
However, despite the terrific result for Honda-powered at the Circuit de Monaco, Tanabe says a lot of hard work will be done between then and the next race in Canada to aid both Red Bull Racing and Scuderia Toro Rosso.
At Red Bull, Max Verstappen finished on the road in second place to Lewis Hamilton on Sunday but was penalised by the stewards with a five-second time penalty for an unsafe release from the pit lane, relegating him to fourth in the final result, while team-mate Pierre Gasly climbed from eighth on the grid to finish fifth, taking fastest lap in the process.
In the sister Toro Rosso team, Daniil Kvyat secured his best result for the team with seventh, as did Alexander Albon in eighth as both capitalised on the likes of Daniel Ricciardo and Kevin Magnussen losing time behind slower drivers having made early pit stops to jump them when they made their own trips to the pits later on in the afternoon.
Tanabe was pleased with the performance levels from both Red Bull and Toro Rosso throughout the weekend at the Circuit de Monaco, but with a very different track to follow at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, he knows Honda will need to work hard in order to be as competitive there as they were this weekend.
“A strong performance resulting in all four cars finishing in the points, in the top eight,” said Tanabe. “Both teams performed strongly all weekend and managed the race strategy very well.
“Now, we take a break from Europe and head to Montreal. The track there is very different to this one, so we will be working hard on our PU development before going to Canada.”
