Spa Humbug: Honda Struggles in Belgium

I realise that this is yet another negative article! This isn’t necessarily because I’m a grumpy "anti-McLaren" Honda fan (though I am). It is simply due to the fact that, at the moment, being a Honda fan isn’t much fun!.

It seems that, as the likes of Renault, Toyota, Torro Rosso, and to an extent, Red Bull improve, Honda simply get worse! What a long way this team has fallen from comfortably being in the top four in 2006 to being what can only be described as a back-marker team in 2008.

The excitement of initial practices in Valencia last race weekend was not reproduced on Friday or Saturday at Spar. In fact, on Saturday, fuel-pressure problems led to Jenson only taking part in 300 yards of practice!

Yet another qualifying disaster led to Rubens and Jenson lining up 16th and 17th, respectively. Soft tyers and front-wing tweaks did nothing to help the team break out of Qually one.

On a positive note, Jenson told ITV’s Louise Goodman that the team had managed to get in front of both Force India drivers and a Williams; I think Martin Brundle summed up the true feeling better, though, when he said, "At least Jenson is in the top 20!"

Unfortunately, Honda’s performance in 2008 Spar qualifying was actually worse than in 2007, where Jenson had managed to get the dismal RA107 up to 12! (Rubens was 17th).

The race wasn’t much better for Honda, who admitted that they had brought the wrong aero package. Rubens started reasonably well, fighting with David Coulthard for a few laps before problems with his gearbox meant he had to retire with 24 laps to go.

He had lost sixth gear, which, unfortunately, meant (due to the new gearbox systems in the cars) that he had to go through sixth to get the seventh. This put unwanted strain on his engine (which has to be used again at Monza); the team thought it best to retire him.

Jenson, fought throughout, reaching 14th at one point. He eventually finished 15th, making up two places and finishing better than last year (2007, DNF).

I know that every fan, including myself, last year, hoped that this year would be better. That was, unfortunately, an 'earth dream' that was not to be. However, 2009 truly does look promising.

The problem is that, until now, next season's car has usually been very heavily influenced by previous seasons. Usually teams like Ferrari and McLaren continue to dominate and build on past success.

Sometimes teams like BMW Sauber take a step forward, sometimes, like Honda and Renault, teams take a step back (or four steps back!).

For the past few seasons, it has been hard for teams to start in a weak position and improve significantly in a short space of time. The RA107 was, in the words of Jenson Button, "a dog of a car" and was therefore near impossible to build on.

So here comes the positive bit, next year everyone will have a clean slate and, in theory, will be starting from the same position (though teams with the big bucks will have a great advantage! C’est la vie!).

It will be then, with Honda’s budget, the full design input of Ross Brawn, a strong technical team, and two highly-skilled drivers that will take Honda back to the top...Fingers crossed.