Honda Hopes To Reunite With Verstappen In Future

Saturday, 13 April 2024 at 10:30

President of Honda corporation Koji Watanabe highlighted the importance of Max Verstappen in their collaboration with Red Bull.

Red Bull made a crucial decision ahead of the 2019 season to start a collaboration with a Japanese car manufacturing company- Honda.

Ever since 2019, Honda has produced power units exclusively for the two Red Bull-owned teams, Red Bull Racing and Toro Rosso (later known as AlphaTauri or RB).

This has been and continues to be one of the most successful collaborations in Formula 1. Red Bull went on to win the Drivers' Championship with Max Verstappen and Honda in 2021 and then dominated in 2022 and 2023.

The team from Milton Keynes is also on a good trajectory to repeat the success in 2024 and perhaps in 2025. The collaboration between Red Bull and Honda ends at the end of the 2025 season, as Red Bull wants to start producing its own power units.

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While Honda leaves to start a new chapter with Aston Martin (and Fernando Alonso), Max Verstappen stays contracted to Red Bull until 2028.

Speaking to motorsport.com, Koji Watanabe suggested he hoped Honda and the Dutchman would be reunited one day, but it probably won't be that soon.

"I don't think that day will come within a very short period of time, but if both continue their Formula 1 activities in the future then we hope that we can work together again one day."

"It is a very good relationship. We trust each other and also the Honda workers love Max. We are proud to work together with Max, so we will miss him in the future."

Nevertheless, the president of the Honda Corporation asserted that the main goal at the moment is to focus on the present and make the most of the company's ongoing collaboration with Red Bull and the triple World Champion. He added:

"But we still have two years together and we promise to do our best to win another world championship together with Max and Red Bull."

"He is so important. He is the number one Formula 1 driver now. Of course, the team management is important and the machinery is important as well, but the combination is crucial and one important piece of that is Max."