Honda has shocked the Formula 1 world today by announcing that it will once again withdraw from the premier class of four-wheeled racing at the end of 2021.
That’s another chapter in an annus horribilis in which Honda has slumped to its worst-ever season in MotoGP with the ongoing absence of reigning champion Marc Marquez due to injury.
However, with today’s news coming thanks not to financial woes related to the coronavirus pandemic but instead as it refocuses its global efforts, it’s unlikely to have an impact on Honda’s number one priority in terms of racing: MotoGP.
Honda has stated that leaving F1 this time is not with a view to “short-term profits,” but instead because of a fundamental shift in its automotive focus as the aim to become carbon-neutral by 2050 and to convert two-thirds of its car sales to electric vehicles by 2030 takes precedence.
That’s unlikely to result in a substantial change in how its two-wheeled racing policy works, however, as the vast majority of its sales are not coming from Western countries with the capability to make the substantial infrastructure changes required for alternatively-fuelled vehicles.
Instead, Honda remains committed to MotoGP because of the tens of millions of motorcycles it sells in the developing world. It produced over 20 million bikes in 2019, and 40% of those sales were accounted for by Indonesia and India alone, with China and Vietnam the only other markets where Honda sold over a million bikes.
And within the company, the impact of the F1 withdrawal is likely to be minimal. Honda’s MotoGP machines (and indeed all its two-wheeled racing projects) are built in-house by Honda Racing Corporation, a subsidy of the Honda Motor Company.
However, while the businesses might be separate, today’s decision could well mean a moderate boost to the HRC budget as the company attempts to get back to winning ways in 2021 and beyond.
Honda is currently last in the MotoGP teams’ standings and fifth out of six in the manufacturers’ championship as Marquez continues to recover from a badly-broken right arm, and significant pressure is being put on MotoGP’s most successful manufacturer to make its RC213V a more rider-friendly package.
Any influx of extra capital is unlikely to have an impact for 2021 thanks to a COVID-enforced engine development freeze – a move that Honda went against the other manufacturers in opposing.
There is arguably precedent for suggesting that Honda’s previous F1 withdrawals have given its two-wheeled effort a boost, too. Within two seasons of last quitting F1 in 2008, Honda had hired Casey Stoner and ended its longest grand prix motorcycle racing title drought in two decades.
That earlier title drought was also ended just as Honda pulled out of F1. It went from 1989 to 1993 without a championship as Wayne Rainey and Yamaha dominated, then the end of its highly-successful McLaren F1 partnership came only one season before HRC teamed up with Mick Doohan and went onto five years dominance of grand prix motorcycle racing, taking every title bar one from 1994 to 2003 with Doohan, Alex Criville (above) and Valentino Rossi.
So far from the F1 news being ominous for Honda’s struggling MotoGP team, it might bode well for its chances of putting 2020’s misery swiftly behind it.
