Now, this is wild. According to Motorsport.com, Honda actually sneaked its second ADUO (Additional Development and Upgrade Opportunities) upgrade onto the track way back at the Spanish Grand Prix, targeting the power unit's turbocharger. That is a proper twist.
Here is the thing: Honda and HRC had previously maintained they would only burn through one of their allowed ADUO opportunities this season, granted because their ICE lagged more than 4% behind the top-output Red Bull Ford Powertrains engine. But when asked about sticking to just one upgrade, Honda Racing Corporation president Koji Watanabe simply dropped the truth: "We used both of them."
As far as ADUO is concerned, we have used up our opportunities for this season,
Let me tell you how it rolled out. The first ADUO upgrade landed at the Netherlands, but that Spec 2 power unit brought some drivability headaches along with it. To fix that, a power unit incorporating the second update went straight onto Lance Stroll's machine at the Spanish Grand Prix—yes, the FIA component lists confirm his fifth turbo of the year arrived right there in Spain. Meanwhile, Fernando Alonso's car received his fifth turbo, seemingly the same upgraded spec, at the Azerbaijan Grand Prix.
When questioned if tackling turbo lag was the primary mission, Watanabe answered simply: "Yes." Splitting the rollout wasn't the original dream, but necessity forced their hand. "It would have been better if we could have introduced everything at once, but it was important to introduce Spec 2 in the Netherlands first," Watanabe explained. "We were also working on measures to address the turbo lag in parallel, so we introduced that in Spain."
Both Aston Martin and Honda faced a brutal start to the year before finally finding a sliver of performance with a major chassis upgrade at the Hungaroring, followed by the first ADUO power unit at Zandvoort. Yet, Watanabe admits they still aren't fully unleashing the machine's absolute potential. While Red Bull once pushed packaging to the absolute limit with tiny sidepods and cooling openings thanks to Honda's old reliability development program, hardware ADUO changes are now completely finished for the year.
"As far as ADUO is concerned, we have used up our opportunities for this season," Watanabe stated. "From here, we will continue working on things that don't involve hardware, as well as developments that will lead into the future. I don't think we are anywhere near extracting the full performance of the PU. I believe there is still room to improve its competitiveness."
