Malaysian GP - Honda - RaceHonda achieved a top ten finish in today's Malaysian Grand Prix at the Sepang Circuit in Kuala Lumpur.
Jenson Button brought his RA108 home in tenth place and team-mate
Rubens Barrichello ended the race in 13th position.
Both drivers improved
on their grid placings during the course of the 56-lap race and lapped consistently with the cars around them, giving the team a valuable indication of the RA108's current level of competitiveness.
The cars ran reliably in the tough conditions and both drivers delivered a solid race performance. In an otherwise fault-free race, the only issue was when Barrichello exceeded the pitlane speed limit after his second pitstop and was required to take a drive-through penalty eight laps later.
Jenson ButtonQ. Does your position today reflect the current performance level of the RA108?
"It was good to finish the full race distance today and we will get a lot of very useful information from this weekend. I'm pretty satisfied with 10th place as that is where the performance of the car is right now. With the majority of cars ahead of us also finishing, it is a good reflection of our overall position."
Q. What progress can be made ahead of Round 3 in Bahrain?
"We're going in the right direction and learning more about the car all the time, so we need to keep up the hard work and continue to develop ahead of the next race in two weeks' time."
Rubens BarrichelloQ.How do you feel about your race today?
"Unfortunately my weekend was compromised when we lost the free practice running on Saturday morning, as I lacked balance in the car for the race today. I had a lot of understeer and was battling with that throughout the race. The drive-through penalty after my second stop was unfortunate, even though I only lost one place, as the markings in the pitlane to indicate where the speed limit ends were not clear enough."
Q. What have you learnt from the first two races of the season?
"We have learnt a great deal from the past two weeks and I have been very encouraged by our reliability. We still have a lot of work to do on the performance but that will come through our development programme over the coming weeks in preparation for Europe. We are quite competitive within the very tight midfield group and it is encouraging to see that both cars made it through a very tough race today. We will learn from our experiences, both positive and negative, and I am confident that we will continue to improve over the next few races."
Ross Brawn, Team Principal
Q. What is your assessment of the car and team's performance this weekend?
"This weekend was more straightforward for the whole field compared with Melbourne and we saw fewer drivers making mistakes. Sepang is also a more representative circuit in terms of car performance, as Melbourne can produce unusual results. Therefore to see Jenson finish the race in 10th place with Rubens just behind, in spite of his problems in the third free practice session, is very encouraging and a real indication of the car's pace. There is still a great deal of work to do but we are really starting to make improvements one step at a time."
Q. After an encouraging start to the season, what are your plans for developing the car in preparation for Europe?
"Our next development step will be introduced for Barcelona where we will see another aero update and we also plan to have some new suspension components. Of course every team will have updates but we feel the rate of our own progress is significant and we are hopeful that it will see us take a step up the grid for the start of the European season."
Source: Honda
