Honda ready for European season

The Formula One European season begins next weekend in Barcelona with Round Four of the 2007 FIA Formula One World Championship – the Spanish Grand Prix.After a four-week break following the flyaway races, the Formula One teams return to Europe and look forward to the challenge of the more traditional circuits on the calendar. The Circuit de Catalunya is familiar to the Honda Racing F1 Team as a regular testing venue and hosted the four-day test this week as the Honda team prepared for the event.

Shuhei Nakamoto, Senior Technical Director “In preparation for the Spanish Grand Prix, we have had a four-day test in Barcelona this week to evaluate various specifications, particularly the latest aerodynamic parts for the RA107. We had gathered a great deal of data and believe that we have found a good set-up combination and made progress with the aerodynamics. The car seems to be working better with the tyres now and our pace and reliability is steady. So a small step forward but there is much work still to do.”

Jenson Button "The fact that we test here so much makes the Grand Prix weekend feel very familiar and of course we know the track inside out. The key to a really quick lap at the Circuit de Catalunya is having a car with good downforce; you need to feel confident when you commit to the very high speed corners. Overtaking can be a real challenge here and one of the best opportunities is going into the first corner after the start. You can squeeze by there once the race has settled down but it is very difficult. The new chicane can also be tricky as it is extremely slippery and so very slow. One little mistake could cost you a lot of time there. It’s also slowed the approach to the old final corner which was a great challenge. ”