Well, he was never able to repeat it !!! Hamilton's pole position being disallowed had surely something to do with Maldonado's good fortune on that day !!
I think there is a real risk of McLaren being able to continue as a top F1 team if they quit Honda. Somehow they have to come up with the money for their own engines and other payoff's Honda brings. There is no way Mercedes will give them the same engine their own team gets. Mercedes does not want McLaren to take points away from themselves, particularly when Ferrari is in resurgence. Their long term sponsorships have all dried up and gone elsewhere. New money would have to be found. Not so easy when you are at the bottom. They have to pay Alonso 30 Million a year and even that may not be enough to keep him if the are a mid pack runner. Williams is probably looking at the same thing from the outside and saying "Hmm...maybe this Honda thing can save us long term". The reason they have Stroll is for the available cash. Honda on the other side gets a fresh start after Mac and Williams is a very solid team. If Honda can get the engine working it could be great for Williams ... and bad for McLaren.
Renault would'nt mind taking on a 4th customer i.e. Mclaren if not Mercedes should Mclaren split with Honda.
Interestingly Claire W said '' we are not a cause of the break up'' (between McLaren + Honda) As if it is a done deal divorce.i didn't hear the fat lady singing yet ..or even any karaoke!
It feels that way to me as well. Honda do not seem to have a plan out of this mess. They lack the strategy and management and evidently the technical ability.
Qualified second (well 1st) in a Williams and won despite his mirrors full of hometown hero Alonso most of the race. It wasn't some fluke or lucky - he was fast from the get go at that race.
All this talk of Honda getting the power-unit sorted soon is quite funny! - Especially in light of all the predictions we had on their F1 return about how they were going to teach everyone how to build an F1 turbo engine! The last time Honda were in F1, they struggled to get their car, with a relatively simple 2.4 V8 engine, sorted, and ended up bailing out of F1 altogether. Right now, there isn't even the slightest hint that Honda are truly on the right track to sorting their power-unit out any time soon, and Claire Williams is no idiot! She's seen the damage that Honda has done to McLaren, and she knows full well that swapping Mercedes power units for Honda power units would be F1 racing suicide! (as Sauber will find out next season!), hence her clear public statement denying the rumour. My monies on Honda struggling in 2018 with Sauber (McLaren having gone back to Mercedes power), and then walking away from F1 at the end of the 2018 season, leaving Sauber either looking for a new engine supplier, or having to leave F1 as well.
There is one fact that still needs to be addressed. In the last 25 years, McLaren has won exactly one GP race. And for years they had Merc power. Honda is only part of their problem.
25 years? I think you mean 5 years, 3 of which were under Honda power. OK, McLaren weren't at their best previously, but never as bad as they are now. Even Ojjeh, the part owner says McLaren has never been so uncompetitive in its whole existence!!
Sorry a miss print! 5 is correct. Obviously they won a lot with Hamilton!!! But they did have Merc power for a lot of years and couldn't do any better than Williams with it.
