Brawn targets Honda title tilt by 2010

Honda team boss Ross Brawn says he has set himself the goal of turning the Brackley squad into title contenders by 2010.

The former Ferrari technical mastermind has been given the challenge of transforming the team into a consistent front-running force in Formula 1 after its fortunes nosedived last season.

At the launch of the Honda RA108 in January, Brawn said he hadn’t been given a deadline from his Japanese bosses to produce results by and that the team had to make consistent improvement over the forthcoming seasons.

In an interview in the latest issue of F1 Racing magazine (on sale now), he reiterates there is no set deadline from Honda Japan, but that he himself wants a title challenge within three seasons.

“We have our own deadlines that are just as important as the directives that may come from above,” he said.

“Honda clearly want to win races and world championships.

“But they’re a company that have been involved in racing for a long time so they understand what a big challenge it is.

“My personal timescale is that within a three-year period I want to see us challenging for the championship

“This year we’ve got what we’ve got; next year I hope we see the first signs of the strengthening of the organisation; and by the third year…we should be able to judge what we’re capable of.”

Despite dire predictions about the 2008 car’s competitiveness during pre-season group testing, Honda has made a positive start to the new campaign.

Nevertheless Brawn has continued to insist that the team’s best chance of making big gains up the grid is next year, when a number of new technical regulations are introduced.

He says that it will have to make a call later in the season as to where its development priorities should lie.

“The year 2009 is very important for us because there’s a change in regulations coming that’ll help ‘reset the clock’ in a number of areas,” he said.

“So we’re going to have to have a careful balance as to where we direct our resources: where we can develop areas of the ’08 car that are relevant to ’09, they’ll get priority.

“If it’s ’08 work that becomes redundant at the end of ’08, then we're going to have to look at where we are in the championship and make some hard decisions, particularly towards the end of the season.”

Source: itv-f1