Honda chief Toyoharu Tanabe described the engine update it is running at its home event in Japan as a “big improvement”, following a further evaluation in practice.
Honda introduced its Spec 3 engine during practice in Russia but opted to revert both Pierre Gasly and Brendon Hartley to Spec 2 for the remainder of the race weekend.
The pair ran with the Spec 3 engine during practice at Suzuka, with Hartley rounding out the top 10 and Gasly taking 13th, the latter compromised by a fuel system problem that shortened his programme.
“It’s good to be on track for our home race,” said Tanabe.
“The latest version of our PU, which we first used on Friday in Sochi, has produced encouraging data today.
“It’s a big improvement and validates the tuning work we carried out on this new PU since Russia.
“Unfortunately, Pierre lost some track time in FP2 with a fuel system issue, but at this point in the weekend, it’s not too critical.”
Gasly is optimistic that the “big push” from Honda’s updated engine will be fully displayed during Saturday’s qualifying session.
“In FP1 the car was good, but I wasn’t as happy in FP2,” he said.
“I don’t want to take big conclusions out of the 15 minutes of running we had, but the Power Unit felt pretty good, once again we were running it quite safe today, we didn’t want to take any risks and I think we’re going to turn it up a bit more tomorrow.
“Hopefully we’ll get the big push tomorrow.”
