Hartley pleased with Honda upgrade on “big horsepower track”

Brendon Hartley says Honda have made clear progress with their new power unit after running it for the first time in practice at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve.

“I think [Friday] was really positive,” said Hartley. “This is a big horsepower track, there’s very long straight lines, it’s about deployment as well. I think we have seen a good step.

Hartley was the quickest of the Toro Rosso drivers on Friday, 1.6 seconds off the fastest time of the day. He said the team still needs to “get everything together and get the most out of, not only the engine, but the car, tyres, aerodynamics and mechanical.”

Hartley admitted the difference in track characteristics compared to Monaco made it hard to feel the benefit from Honda’s new power unit.

“Everyone is happy with how it went,” he said. “I would be lying if I told you I felt something drastically different from inside the car, because there is so much more to it, but it is a very positive step.”

“You go from Monaco, maximum downforce, [then] you come here with low downforce; you have already, I don’t know the number but I’m going to say 900 horsepower; when you’re talking about these numbers from inside the cockpit, the different in aero configuration feels [like] more so it’s very hard to comment.

“But drive-ability was fantastic. It’s more you see it in the numbers and the lap time.”

Honda hasn’t had any technical problems with the new unit so far, Hartley added. “They were doing a lot of tuning in the background [but] no real issues.”

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2018 F1 season

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