Honda drivers looking forward to Fuji challenge

The Honda Racing F1 Team makes a welcome return to Japan this week for its second home race of the season, the 2007 Japanese Grand Prix at the Fuji International Speedway, Round 15 of the FIA Formula One World Championship.

"This year will be a new challenge for both myself and the team,” comments Jenson Button. The Fuji circuit is an unknown quantity so I will be studying the circuit layout with our engineers in advance of the race but we will only find out its true characteristics during our track walk on Thursday and the first few laps of practice on Friday.

“The re-designed circuit is another Herman Tilke special, and after the fantastic job that he did with Istanbul Park, it will be interesting to see how this circuit matches up. There is a long 1.5km start-finish straight which should allow for some overtaking combined with some exciting looking twists and turns.”

Rubens Barrichello has raced at Fuji before but agrees it will be quite a different challenge when he hits the track this weekend: "I last raced at Fuji back in 1991 in Formula 3 but the circuit has been totally modernised since those days. It will be very exciting to race on the new layout and I am sure that the organisers will have done an excellent job with improving the existing circuit.”