Honda's decision to maximize its power unit development tokens in the 2026 Formula 1 season has revealed a surprise. Honda Racing Corporation (HRC) president Koji Watanabe disclosed that the second ADUO (Additional Development and Upgrade Opportunities) upgrade was introduced much earlier than many suspected, specifically at the Spanish Grand Prix, focusing on the turbocharger. This revelation dismisses assumptions that Honda would only use one of the two ADUO opportunities granted by the FIA.
Since the start of the season, Aston Martin and Honda have had to fight hard. Their performance only began to show signs of improvement after a major chassis upgrade package was introduced at the Hungaroring. In Zandvoort, the team also fitted a power unit with the first ADUO upgrade. However, who would have thought that the second upgrade had quietly made its debut at the Barcelona circuit?
"We used both of them," Watanabe told Motorsport.com when asked why Honda decided to use only one ADUO upgrade. "We introduced the first ADUO upgrade in the Netherlands, and then we put a PU incorporating the second update into Lance Stroll's car at the Spanish Grand Prix. The Spec 2 PU we introduced in the Netherlands had some drivability issues, so we introduced an improved turbo at the Spanish Grand Prix."
FIA data shows that Stroll's car indeed used its fifth turbocharger of the season at the Spanish GP. Meanwhile, Fernando Alonso's car also received its fifth turbo, which appears to be the upgraded version, at the Azerbaijan GP. This step confirms that Honda is serious about addressing weaknesses in their power unit, especially the turbo lag issues that have been complained about.
Watanabe explained that the main purpose of the turbo upgrade was to address turbo lag. "Yes," he answered briefly. He then elaborated on the reasoning behind the staggered introduction. "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. We were also working on measures to address the turbo lag in parallel, so we introduced that in Spain. So the application ended up being split between the two."
Nevertheless, Watanabe admitted that Honda is still not fully exploiting the potential of their power unit. When Honda was still supplying Red Bull, they were not allowed to introduce performance upgrades, but they continued to use simulations to determine the operating limits of the PU and gradually raise those limits year after year. This is what Honda referred to as "reliability development". For example, in 2024 Red Bull adopted extremely small sidepods and reduced the size of the cooling openings, which was made possible by raising the PU's operating limits.
With the ADUO tokens now exhausted, Honda is focusing on optimizing the existing power unit. The next challenge is how to maximize performance without additional development opportunities, while maintaining reliability. For Aston Martin, this partnership with Honda will be crucial in determining whether they can bounce back and compete at the front in the coming seasons.
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