The Honda Racing F1 Team achieved a top 10 finish in today's Malaysian GrandPrix at the Sepang Circuit in Kuala Lumpur.
Jenson Button brought his RA108home in 10th place and team-mate Rubens Barrichello ended the race in 13thposition. Both drivers improved on their grid placings during the course of the 56-laprace and lapped consistently with the cars around them, giving the team avaluable indication of the RA108's current level of competitiveness.
The cars ran reliably in the tough conditions and both drivers delivered asolid race performance. In an otherwise fault-free race, the only issue waswhen Rubens exceeded the pitlane speed limit after his second pitstop andwas required to take a drive-through penalty eight laps later.
RESULTS Drivers Car No. Chassis No. Race Result Jenson Button 16 RA108-02 P10 01:35.715 Rubens Barrichello 17 RA108-04 P13 01:36.693 Weather Hot and sunny Temperatures Air: 30-31°C Track: 38-46°C
JENSON BUTTON Q. Does your position today reflect the current performance level of theRA108? A. "It was good to finish the full race distance today and we will get a lotof very useful information from this weekend. I'm pretty satisfied with 10thplace as that is where the performance of the car is right now. With themajority of cars ahead of us also finishing, it is a good reflection of ouroverall position."
Q. What progress can be made ahead of Round 3 in Bahrain? A. "We're going in the right direction and learning more about the car allthe time, so we need to keep up the hard work and continue to develop aheadof the next race in two weeks' time."
RUBENS BARRICHELLO Q. How do you feel about your race today? A. "Unfortunately my weekend was compromised when we lost the free practicerunning on Saturday morning, as I lacked balance in the car for the racetoday. I had a lot of understeer and was battling with that throughout therace. The drive-through penalty after my second stop was unfortunate, eventhough I only lost one place, as the markings in the pitlane to indicatewhere the speed limit ends were not clear enough."
Q. What have you learnt from the first two races of the season? A. "We have learnt a great deal from the past two weeks and I have been veryencouraged by our reliability. We still have a lot of work to do on theperformance but that will come through our development programme over thecoming weeks in preparation for Europe. We are quite competitive within thevery tight midfield group and it is encouraging to see that both cars madeit through a very tough race today. We will learn from our experiences, bothpositive and negative, and I am confident that we will continue to improveover the next few races."
ROSS BRAWN Team Principal
Q. What is your assessment of the car and team's performance this weekend? A. "This weekend was more straightforward for the whole field compared withMelbourne and we saw fewer drivers making mistakes. Sepang is also a morerepresentative circuit in terms of car performance, as Melbourne can produceunusual results. Therefore to see Jenson finish the race in 10th place withRubens just behind, in spite of his problems in the third free practicesession, is very encouraging and a real indication of the car's pace. Thereis still a great deal of work to do but we are really starting to makeimprovements one step at a time."
Q. After an encouraging start to the season, what are your plans fordeveloping the car in preparation for Europe? A. "Our next development step will be introduced for Barcelona where we willsee another aero update and we also plan to have some new suspensioncomponents. Of course every team will have updates but we feel the rate ofour own progress is significant and we are hopeful that it will see us takea step up the grid for the start of the European season."
