Adrian Newey says he didn’t find out what a pickle Honda was in until November.
Newey says Honda bailed on F1 after the 2021 season and took a year away from the sport. And when they came back only about 30% of the original staff came with them.
They returned to F1 under the 2023 rules structure which put a budget cap on engine development. They still haven’t caught up with the teams that already had their 2026 engine programs in progress in pre-spending-cap 2022.
Apparently Honda didn’t bother to tell anybody how bad off they were until he (Newey) went to Japan last November to run to ground the rumors that they were WAY WAY behind in development.
One point I found very telling was that according to Newey, it’s not the KERS, it’s Honda’s ICE that sucks the worst.
https://www.planetf1.com/news/adrian-newey-aston-martin-honda-2026-f1-engine-issues-awareness
It would be a shame to see Newey’s masterpiece scuttled because — and through no fault of his own — Honda had forgot how to build engines.
Sad situation, but F1 will survive it all.