Honda benefited from Red Bull and Toro Rosso being closely linked

F1 News

1 January 2020 at 10:13

Honda and Red Bull had a successful first season together in many opinions but Toyoharu Tanabe is still looking for improvement but admitted the team benefitted from providing two teams.

2019 saw Red Bull and Toro Rosso both run a Honda engine and it worked to reasonable levels of success. Max Verstappen secured three race wins including a home win for Red Bull in Austria as well as victories in Germany and Brazil. Toro Rosso also achieved podiums using a Honda engine.

Toyoharu Tanabe has revealed the team are looking to build next season and felt they did a good job last season.

"Of course it was a challenge because we needed more employees and engines. We did a solid job for both teams," Tanabe told Motorsport-Total.com.

"We asked the engineers and mechanics.

"What can we do better next year? We looked at what we did this year."

The engine supplier provided engines for two teams in 2019 and Tanabe felt the fact the two are linked is a huge benefit.

"There are differences between the teams," he added.

"But we also learned a lot from both at the same time. We also benefit from the fact that Red Bull and Toro Rosso are directly connected and that Red Bull is the team with priority."