Honda to return in 2015 as McLaren engine supplier

Honda is returning to Formula One racing in 2015, after a seven-year hiatus, as McLaren’s engine partner, the Japanese carmaker said yesterday.

The link-up between Honda and McLaren, the second most successful team in the sport after Ferrari in terms of race wins and drivers’ titles, will revive one of the greatest Formula One partnerships which was marked by multiple championships with the late Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost between 1988 and 1992.

Honda, who will replace Mercedes as McLaren’s engine partner, withdrew from the sport in late 2008 in the middle of a global financial crisis after years of hardly ever winning.

The company said Formula One’s new engine regulations would allow it to apply racing technology to its road cars.

“As the direction of Formula One’s new technologies and the direction that Honda aims at for development matches, the young engineers who will be responsible for Honda in the future started to voice their desire to take part in the challenge,” Honda Motor Co Chief Executive Takanobu Ito told a news conference.

“More so than in the past, we can expect feedback from the race cars to common road cars and vice- versa.”

Formula One is introducing a new V6 1.6-litre engine aided by high-power turbo technology with energy recovery systems from next season.

Ito gave two examples of technologies that could be applied from race cars to road cars – regenerative energy from the turbo, which changes the turbo’s rotational energy to electricity, and downsizing the turbo.

Martin Whitmarsh, McLaren’s Chief Executive, said crossover technologies would help the team.

“I think Formula One has been absolutely slow to adapt and to change to the new challenges which are relevant to the needs of society... Downsizing turbo charging, heavier hybrid content, these are areas (in which) I know Honda will excel,” he said.

In recent years, Honda has been criticised for lacking the daring zeal it once had as an innovator. Ito hopes participation in the sport could change that view.

“We want to be an interesting and exciting company,” said Ito, who is known for designing the all-aluminium chassis of the NSX sports car released in 1991.

Button, who moved to McLaren in 2009, said he was “thrilled and excited” about Honda’s return, adding in a statement: “McLaren-Honda: I know how much passion, success and pride are encapsulated within just those two words.”