Red Bull not expecting “massive gain” from new Honda engine

Honda’s latest Formula 1 engine upgrade will not provide Red Bull with a “massive gain” at the French Grand Prix, according to Pierre Gasly.

The Japanese manufacturer has continued its aggressive approach to its engine development by bringing a ‘Spec 3’ power unit to Paul Ricard, which will be used by both Red Bull drivers and Toro Rosso’s Daniil Kvyat.

Red Bull has so far been unable to challenge rivals Ferrari and Mercedes for victories in 2019, though Gasly does not expect Honda’s latest engine offering to fully wipe out its current deficit.

“We have a new spec Honda - I think the last one we introduced was more on the reliability-side,” Gasly said.

“This one will be a bit more focused on the performance, but we don’t expect a massive gain from it.

“I think the overall performance will be slightly increased but it’s not like it’s going to change massively - or catch the teams ahead of us massively.

“So let’s see what we can do during the weekend but it should give us a bit more in the race but it’s not going to be massively different in qualifying.”

But the Frenchman is hopeful of improved performance at his home race at a circuit tipped to better favour Red Bull’s package compared to the last race in Canada.

“I think it’s a track that probably suits our package a bit more than Canada,” he explained.

“You still have many long straights, which unfortunately are still a bit tricky for us, even though we are making progress.

“But I think we have new little bits on the car coming and I think we should be more competitive here than we were in Canada.”

Teammate Max Verstappen said he does not suddenly expect to “lead the pack” in France but added Red Bull is happy to take every added performance boost it can from Honda, even if it leads to early penalties.

“It’s always good to have upgrades but I’m not expecting to suddenly lead the pack, but every little step we can have we take it, even if it means we are already on our third engine,” Verstappen said.

“Reliability is not a problem but we want performance. As you could see in Canada, even with not the best pace you could still easily get to a fifth position anyway.

“I prefer to get more and more competitive because then coming through the field is more easy.”