Before the Australian Grand Prix, reacting to rumors about a possible return of Honda to competition as McLaren’s engine supplier, Martin Whitmarsh, the director of the British team, stated that the future MP4-29 would indeed be powered by the German V6 while still keeping the door open to any options that might eventually arise for 2015.<\/p>\n
This weekend, Toto Wolff, head of motorsport at Mercedes, displayed a certain optimism mixed with caution regarding his association with McLaren: “Our goal has always been to work with McLaren because they are reliable partners and we will benefit from collaborating with them,” explained the Austrian in the pages of *Autosport*. “I am not sure it’s completely done yet, so we continue to negotiate with them and hope for an extension beyond 2014.”<\/p>\n
Just in case, and while some media indicate that Honda engineers are already at work in Woking, Mercedes is preparing to take measures to ensure that, if an agreement is reached between McLaren and Honda for engine supply from 2015, the Japanese manufacturer cannot benefit from the collaboration of the English team with Mercedes next season: \u00ab If we do not manage to secure a commitment, it will be essential for us to ensure there is no chance of intelligence transfers. But we are all professionals, and it is about having the right contract and protecting technology transfer, so we will have to think about it. For now, I am trying to be optimistic and hope for an extension of the contract. \u00bb<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
As rumors of a McLaren-Honda partnership in 2015 are in full swing, Mercedes, the current engine supplier for the British team, wishes to continue the venture with Woking beyond 2014 but is already preparing to take necessary security measures in case of an agreement between McLaren and the Japanese manufacturer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":41009,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,1749],"tags":[596,947,964],"class_list":["post-17679","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-f1","category-news","tag-honda","tag-mclaren","tag-mercedes-amg-f1"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n