“Rubens was settled in himself from the start,” Fry stressed, “but in a new
Formula 1 team there are many things to learn. In some cases Rubens has been the person teaching us, because he has a lot more experience of Formula 1 than what was BAR and now the
Honda team has.
“He has made an immense contribution in terms of helping us with our traction control and braking system, but at the end of the day he wants to win races and I think this year he is better-prepared for that than he has ever been in the past.”
The final piece of the Honda driver jigsaw is
Red Bull Racing refugee Klien, a man whose star waned a little last year following a promising Formula 1 debut season in 2004. Fry, though, was overwhelmingly positive about the effect the Austrian's arrival had had on the team.
“Christian has done a spectacular job,” he enthused. “Obviously we had seen him working for his prior team, but we didn't know him very much as a person before. I think the things he has excelled at are fitting into the team, and the quality of his feedback has been very good. We can put Christian in the car and the feedback we will get is very similar to that of Jenson or Rubens.
“The third thing is he has been both fast and reliable. He had not made any mistakes, and just one crash in testing can put a team back quite a lot because you have to replace the parts damaged in the crash. Having someone who can both go fast and do so reliably is a big asset.”
