Ross Brawn has spoken of his conviction that Honda is fast making progress in 2008, after
Jenson Button scored the Brackley-based concern's first points of the season in the Spanish Grand Prix last time out.
Though
Rubens Barrichello finished seventh on the road in the curtain-raiser in Melbourne, the experienced Brazilian was subsequently disqualified for having gone through a red light at the exit of the pit-lane, meaning Button's sixth place in Barcelona – despite the British ace struggling with the car's ride quality during the race weekend – marked
Honda's first ‘official' points of the campaign.
Now that the team has broken its points duck for the year, Brawn is looking forward with increasing optimism, echoing Button's remarks that the ever-improving RA108 should perform better around the technically-challenging and physically-demanding Istanbul Park – one of only two anti-clockwise tracks on this year's calendar – than it did at the Circuit de Catalunya.
“We were extremely pleased to pick up our first points of the season in Barcelona,” the Japanese outfit's team principal underlined, “and it was just reward for the efforts that everyone has put in over the last few months. We took many positives from the race weekend, including the good performance of the new aero package and our strategy working well, with the execution of the pit-stops being especially good.
“Of course, there are challenges to be overcome, however I am confident we have the right attitude and commitment to resolve these. There is tremendous potential in this team, and our three points in Barcelona was the first step at the start of a very intense few months of racing.
“Istanbul Park is a great race track which our drivers really enjoy. Although there is no opportunity to test before this race, we will have some small refinements to the car and an aero package to suit the characteristics of this particular circuit.
