Force India Against Providing Aid to Struggling McLaren

Following their rocky start to the season, McLaren-Honda are now in discussions with Mercedes to let the German manufacturer aid them with regard to the power unit. Although the nitty-gritty details are still under wraps, the idea is to help with the electronics and hybrid systems of the power unit. However, the plan has hit a few snags because Force India deputy team principal Robert ‘Bob’ Fernley has said that he will not support such a partnership.

“As a team obviously that has not only paid for its engines, but contributed to the development of them, I would certainly be very negative with sharing that technology with another team that is a competitor,” he said.

Toto Wolff has declined to reveal the intricacies of the Honda talks and all he said was “We are not doing anything for Honda and that is the status quo. So unless that situation changes, I don’t want to contribute to rumours out there that are false and I think are damaging for Honda, and create hard standpoints from teams or other stakeholders. We will see what happens.”

Wolff remains confident that Honda will ultimately overcome their issues. “It is important for F1,” he said. “Honda is an important factor in F1, a massive and very successful company and I have no doubt they will eventually be where they expect to be.”