Alonso places 100% faith in Honda amid Monza reality check

Monza, a Friday at the Italian Grand Prix weekend. The FP2 timing screen shows Fernando Alonso's name in 19th, 2.468 seconds off pole and 1.174 seconds behind the Williams. Only two Cadillacs and Lance Stroll are behind. People say Monza is the temple of speed, where engine power is mercilessly exposed. In that temple, Aston Martin and the Honda power unit are kneeling. But the notable thing is not the lap time number. It is the sentence spoken by Fernando Alonso right after the session: he still places 100% faith in Honda. An unwavering faith, even though the timing board says otherwise. That contradiction is what deserves analysis. The context of the Aston Martin-Honda relationship has already been written in heroic stories. Honda left F1, returned, took Max Verstappen to titles with Red Bull, then left again. Now they return as an engine supplier, carrying the ambition to build their own empire with a team built around their support. Aston Martin is not the Red Bull of 2026-2026, where everything was optimized from chassis to engine. This is a team struggling in the midfield, completely dependent on Honda's strength. If you look at the most recent result before Monza, P9 at Zandvoort was a rare flash of light in a dark season. Alonso earned a valuable point, confirming the development direction of the chassis is correct. But at Monza, where drivers live only through engine revs, the chassis cannot save the lack of power. The issue lies in the power unit. Shintaro Orihara – head of the Honda project at Milton Keynes – has spoken about combustion characteristic improvements. They are not replacing the entire engine, not developing a new turbo component, not touching the energy recovery system. They are only adjusting fuel maps, valve parameters, and how the combustion chamber operates to solve a problem called driveability. The problem appeared already in Budapest and Zandvoort, where Alonso and Stroll felt the engine response was not smooth, prone to loss of control when exiting low-speed corners. These combustion characteristic changes are not a revolution. They are small patches. On the dyno and in simulation, Honda has data showing improvement. But on Monza's track, where high-speed straights and optimal aero efficiency matter, these patches are not enough to pull the AMR25 out of the bottom group. A 2.468-second gap to the leader is not a gap of a few combustion parameters. It is a system-wide gap – chassis and engine – that is still lacking. The tactical machine does not run on emotion; it runs on information. And the information at Monza is very straightforward: Aston Martin is currently the weakest team among Honda-powered teams. Cadillac is new, Stroll is not high-performing, and Alonso – though a two-time champion – cannot compensate for lack of engine power with driving skill. But the interesting story lies in the hidden part. Honda's technical team has been reinforced with personnel from past successful eras. Engineers who worked with Red Bull, who optimized the engine so Max Verstappen could exploit every rpm, now sit in the control room of the new Honda project. The facilities at Sakura, Japan, are among the most modern engine development centres in the world. Looking long-term, that is a reason to believe in Honda. But don't ask who drives well; ask which side the system is on. Current F1 systems – with cost caps and development restrictions – are on the side of teams with abundant resources and their own factories. Aston Martin is not Honda's works team. They are merely a customer. What does that mean? It means when Honda develops a new part, they will prioritize their own works team first. It means when problems arise, the technical information flow will be filtered before reaching Aston Martin. It means in the development race, customer teams often have to queue behind. That does not mean all will remain terrible. F1 history is full of examples of customer teams winning. But at the current moment, with the gap to top teams still huge, and with Monza just being the first of a three-round high-speed sequence (Monza, Baku, Las Vegas), Aston Martin's position has no room for optimism. Ahead of them are long straights where the power unit weakness will continue to be exposed. Fans may wonder: why does Alonso keep his faith alive? The reason lies in the character of a highly experienced driver. Alonso has lived through dark times with Ferrari, has seen expectations collapse at McLaren-Honda. But he knows that big change does not happen overnight. He knows Honda needs time, needs race-by-race data, needs honest driver feedback to adjust. And Alonso is one of the most honest feedback-providing drivers. He doesn't sugar-coat. He calls things by their name. After Monza, he will likely say not that the car is good, but that the engine is not strong enough, the chassis needs improvement, and they need more time. That honesty is an intangible asset of Aston Martin. However, honesty does not lower lap times. My lesson from the mistake named Kanté – where I underestimated a player just by looking at limited data – taught me one thing: any analysis can be wrong. Conversely, Alonso's faith in Honda might be right, but it does not change the physical reality of the 2026 season. Internal combustion engines still have limits that cannot be surpassed by just software update. Improving combustion is necessary, but it only makes the car easier to drive at low speed, not faster on the Monza straights. Look at the technical detail Orihara mentioned: fuel combustion efficiency improved on the dyno, but not yet confirmed on track. This is the gap between laboratory data and track reality, a risk-filled gap. Many manufacturers have made big strides on the dyno but failed when put on track due to environmental temperature, track surface quality, how the driver operates the throttle. Monza is a brutal test: if those improvements were real, straight-line speed would show it. The reality says Aston Martin remains one of the slowest. So how should we read this performance? It can be interpreted in two ways. One: Honda is taking a conservative approach, fixing issues incrementally under cost-cap pressure, and they want to avoid the risk of a full-scale development overhaul. Two: they are saving strength for the 2026 revolution, when entirely new engine regulations take effect. The choice to focus only on combustion, rather than upgrading the turbocharger or electric system, shows Honda is prioritizing reliability over absolute performance. They may fear that a major change will destabilize the car and cause more problems. They choose the safe route: keep the old engine running while best personnel and resources have already shifted to the 2026 project. This explains why the Monza updates were small patches. It also explains why Alonso – under contract until 2026 – still maintains faith: he knows 2026 is a transition year. When we look at top teams: Mercedes, Ferrari, Red Bull each have their own engine factory or a close partnership. They can integrate chassis and engine in the same design space. In contrast, Aston Martin has to receive a power unit designed by another company in an asynchronous development process. This is a structural barrier even if Honda has great engineers. A framework only matures after being contradicted by reality. In 2026, I thought Aston Martin could jump forward with the new Honda engine. I was wrong. Engine power is not something that can be patched in one season. It takes five years, regulatory stability, and a chassis design team aligned with the engine. And that brings us to a bigger question: how long can Alonso wait? At age 44 in 2026, Alonso will be one of the oldest drivers in history. He is still fast, still passionate, but his time window is limited. His statements of Honda support may be true, but there is no guarantee that the support will bear fruit before he hangs up his helmet. What Honda needs to do, not only to create a fast engine but also an environment that can retain talent like Alonso, is to prove itself with on-track speed results. FP2 at Monza is not a disaster in literal terms, but it is a reminder: faith is essential, but not sufficient. It must be accompanied by technical improvement measurable by lap time. Until that happens, numbers will remain the best storytellers. And at Monza, Honda's story is still one of faith, not speed. One last thing: Alonso once said that to achieve a successful project, you need 100% commitment from all parties. And he believes Honda has that 100% commitment. I want to believe that too. But in a world of data and lap times, I learned that emotion is only one part of the equation – and the rest belongs to numbers, which never lie. The Monza race is still ahead. FP2 is only an early signal. But for a writer like me, early signals are usually the most honest. And it is saying that Aston Martin remains far from the leading group. The real question is not 'does Alonso believe-to-faith', but 'can Honda make it in time' – and the answer, albeit late, will come in 2026, when everything begins again from zero. Let us wait and see.