HONDA'S HOMEGROWN F1 GLORY

As Honda re-enters Formula One this year, partnering with McLaren's MP4-30 chassis and 1.6 litre Turbo V6

I can’t help reflecting on its glorious F1 history, beginning in 1964.

A few weeks ago as I roared along Florida’s Interstate 95 revving an S2000 to 8,000rpm,

and then wrote about meeting Shigeru Uehara, the designer of the original NSX and S2000 in 1989, it’s important to remember that in 1964 Honda was totally and completely responsible for its F1 car and engine, without any help from outsiders.

Soichiro Honda was dedicated to winning a Formula One race with his own team, and turned to Yoshio Nakamura to create the chassis and Tadashi Kume to design the engine. 

Tadashi Kume

In addition Honda designed its own six-speed sequential transmission. It was pure Japanese inspiration to the core.

The first car was the RA270, and the engine a 1.5 litre V12 producing 230hp.

As Ron Dennis has warned that this year’s F1 season will be a testing and development era for the chassis and engine combo, so 1964 and 1965 turned out to be challenging seasons for the fledgling Japanese F1 team.

It wasn’t until the final round in 1965, the Mexican Grand Prix, that American Richie Ginther won the first race for Honda, celebrating with Nakamura.

This was the great RA271, a formidable racing car with astonishing standing start acceleration.

The V12 engine was mounted transversely, which made the car much wider than its competitors, and it was also slightly heavier, but its technical superiority ensured it would make its mark in the F1 history books.

Honda RA272 at Spa Francorchamps

In its later F1 efforts, Honda chose just to provide engines to both Williams and McLaren, with Ayrton Senna bringing home the bacon time and again.

Honda established itself as an engineering-led company, where engineering excellence was behind its product development, pushed by Mr. Honda personally.

When Soichiro died, and the ‘boy’s club’ of Nakamura, Kume, Yamamoto and Kawamoto retired, the company fell into the hands of its Marketing department, in time becoming a slave to the whims of the US market, where it had invested heavily in one of the first US-based Japanese manufacturing plants.

Today, there are glimpses of engineering brilliance shining through the marketing BS, and Honda is still a company with impressive engineering credentials, but back in the 60s and 70s those of us working in the automotive media recognized Honda’s holistic engineering integrity and inventive spirit was truly driving the company.

It was such a pleasure to sit down with Honda engineers whenever they attended a new model launch. They were all sincere, skilled and sophisticated thinkers who contributed a great deal to Honda’s growing reputation for excellence.

Most important, they loved car-talk!

QUICK TRIPS - FRANCE

CLAUDE MONET'S HOUSE AT GIVERNY

A visit to Monet’s beautiful house and gardens seems to be on the Bucket List of most Francophiles visiting Paris.

And why not?

The journey on the Autoroute A14 (with tolls) is just 55 minutes; and on the more suburban A15, it’s just ten minutes longer.

Actually, Giverny is a tiny village near the Seine surrounding Monet’s Estate, so on the maps you are looking to head for the nearby town of Vernon.

Leaving the A14 at Exit 16 onto the D181, head North towards Vernon, and cross the River Seine, joining Rue Claude Monet, and a few minutes later you’re parking the car.

Born in 1840 Monet may just be the most famous of France’s impressionist painters, certainly he was one of the most commercially-successful.

He was a wily bird and obviously made enough from his paintings to establish a very grand estate, building his large house and extensive gardens.

One of the best studies of his life and work are by the author and garden historian Caroline Holmes, but even though you may be attracted to Monet’s style, the Estate is another thing altogether.

The gardens are famous for the lily ponds and the Japanese arched bridge, but wandering among the sections you find just as many apparently wild and untrained areas, as formal beds.

It may look wild, but Monet was a canny gardener as well as a skilled painter. It was all carefully planned by the Master.

Mind you, he was wealthy enough to afford assistants to plant and prune, and the result is one of the most beautiful gardens you will visit.

French schoolchildren’s excursions happen every day during the opening period from April to October, and it was fun seeing the kindergarten class as we were wandering among the flowers.

There’s a very well laid-out flower shop, and a restaurant adjacent to the Estate, and my omelette avec jambon, and glass of Sancerre I had for lunch was just the thing after a fascinating and relaxing 90 minute tour.

If you enjoy fine art and fine gardening, this visit is a must if you’re visiting Paris.

TESLA'S REVENUE REVELATIONS!

Tesla Motors has found a neat way to augment any profits it makes from selling cars.

So neat, that in the last two quarters of 2014 it made an additional USD$66 million! Which is almost 40% of total revenue.

Bloomberg News’ Cory Johnson has revealed that Tesla gets a tax credit in 12 States for every Zero Emission Vehicle (ZEV) it makes, which it can then sell to any carmaker who is making polluting vehicles.

The States are; Oregon, California, Arizona, New Mexico, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Maine and Vermont.

In fact of the total revenue Tesla makes per car, almost USD$6,000 comes from selling tax credits.

This week, in a bid to calm and reassure owners and would-be buyers of the Tesla Model S about ‘range anxiety’, Elon Musk announced a slew of software changes which can be implemented OTA (Over The Air) to improve battery life and extend the vehicle’s driving range. No details on how many extra miles you can travel, but presently, the most expensive Model S can travel 265 miles on a single charge.

The eight aforementioned States are also moving quickly to build charging stations, which will recharge ALL battery-powered vehicles. However Tesla is also building its own Supercharger stations, which can fully charge a Model S in around 2-3 hours.

QUICK TRIPS - ITALY

Following the 'Palladian Trail'

Andrea Palladio - Architetto

Just west of Venezia you'll find one of the most fascinating of driving tours in northern Italy. Many local companies offer tours which follow a trail of fabulous villas designed and built by the famous architect Andrea Palladio.

If you base yourself in either Padova or Vicenza, you will be right in the heart of the area, which extends as far to the west as Valpolicella.

We have stayed in Vicenza at the excellent Hotel Campo Marzio.

Palladio was a very smart marketer as well as an architect with a grand vision.

He undertook the construction of a 'facade' for the town hall in Vicenza, which was so successful his career took off.

Town Hall, Vicenza

He received many commissions for villas large and small. Not all of the villas I'm including here are 'on the tour', but they do represent a good sampling of his work.

The Villa del Doge near Treviso is one of my favourites.

As is the famous Villa Rotonda, close to Vicenza.

Then there's the smaller La Serenella near Valpolicella.

Andrea's name is associated today with 'Palladian Windows' which are famous for their curved top, but his work from the 16th century is magnificent, and if you're in the Veneto region, not to be missed.

*QUICK TRIPS suggestions presume you have access to your own personal transport, but in this instance there are tours which use coaches to follow the trail.

S2000 - HONDA'S F1-BRED SPORTS CAR

During Press Day at the 1989 Tokyo Motor Show I stopped by the Honda stand to marvel at a bare, aluminium chassis of the just-announced NSX sports car.

Honda NSX

After a few moments contemplating the beautifully welded joints and impeccable finish of the structure, I was joined by a slight, studious Japanese gentleman, to whom I remarked on the outstanding quality of the design and finish.

He introduced himself as Shigeru Uehara, the chief engineer of the NSX project, and he was truly delighted to hear my observations, and very eager to discuss the project.

We talked for almost 30 minutes about the NSX and his other obsession, Formula One, and of his close friendship with Ayrton Senna.

Ayrton Senna 1992

The next mention of Uehara-san was 1995, when Honda showed a sports car concept called the SSM at the Tokyo Motor Show.

Honda Sports Study Model (SSM)

In 1999 the concept became the production S2000.

The final design of the production car was massaged by Ken Okuyama, who designed the  original NSX.

Later that year, whilst visiting my friend and former neighbor Larry in New Jersey, he proudly told me that he had bought one of the first cars to arrive at his local Honda dealer.

Shigeru Uehara

We went for a spin, and I immediately fell in love with Uehara’s ‘baby’!

The 2.0L engine delivered 247hp at 8300 rpm, and as you raced up through the six-speed transmission at maximum revs the sheer exhilaration was overwhelming. What a fantastic driving experience!

Shigeru Uehara took all he learned from the big-budget NSX project, and crafted a beautiful, handsome, dream machine that sounded like an F1 car as you blasted through the gears along Interstate 95.

Fast forward to March 2015, and on a visit to Fort Myers, Florida to catch up with Larry, he revealed he still owned the S2000, and also that he never intended to sell it.

Larry's Honda S2000 on the beach at Fort Myers, Florida

So, what do you do when faced with such news? Simple, you pull back the covers, wheel it out of the garage and blast off for a wonderful reminiscence of my first drive in the car.

Florida, being the most boring state in all of the USA to drive through, meant there would be precious little blasting through the gears, and letting the tail slide out with some adventurous driving.

I satisfied myself with a few squirts up to 8000 rpm, and we tooled around with the top down discussing Uehara’s grand design, and just plain having fun!

The interesting thing is that the S2000 is a very practical car, because I have it on good authority that the trunk can fit two full-size golf bags!

Yes, this little gem has only 41,000 miles on the clock!

Production of the S2000 ended in 2009, which means it’s now a classic! Total sales were 110, 673.

Thanks Larry. Don’t forget our discussion about you leaving me the S2000 in your final will and testament!