IndyCar: Honda and its teams roll with the punches

Going into Saturday's opener at the Dual in Detroit, it was easy to spot the Honda teams in the IndyCar paddock. Most were lining up their cars from mid-pack on back – wearing weary faces. Seven of the top-10 qualifiers were in Chevrolets and all signs pointed to another Bow Tie butt-kicking.

Then Mother Nature changed the script, the rains came, strategies changed and suddenly Honda had a pulse. Carlos Munoz and Marco Andretti timed their wet-to-dry-to-wet tire changes perfectly and finished 1-2 when the race was called after 47 of 70 laps.

It was the second triumph of 2015 for Honda (James Hinchcliffe captured New Orleans in a wet, yellow-plagued race in April) and some temporary happiness in what's been a humbling season.

But Honda can't bank on rain every race, nor can it hide from the fact that Chevrolet has built a better mousetrap, aka aero kit package, for this year.

"It's pretty obvious. We don't have the pace Chevrolet does," said Graham Rahal (TOP), who has been Honda's most consistent weapon with a pair of second places while ranking fifth in the Verizon point standings.

"It's been like fighting with one hand tied behind your back," said 2014 Indy 500 winner Ryan Hunter-Reay (LEFT), who ranks 13th after seven starts with a best of fifth place.

"Timing and scoring pretty much tells the story," said veteran engineer Mike Cannon, who works for Dale Coyne's two-car Honda effort.

The statistics bare that out. After seven races, Chevy drivers have led 485 laps to Honda's 102, won every pole position and swept three podiums in its five victories. It's drivers rank 1-4 in the points (and seven out of the top 10) and they led 193 out of 200 laps at Indianapolis.

"There were two packs at Indy – the Chevy pack up front and the Honda pack," acknowledged Steve Eriksen (RIGHT), Vice President and COO of Honda Performance Development.

Of course the line of demarcation is the aero kits. Pratt & Miller built and developed Chevrolet's while Wirth Research handled Honda's.

"This guy designed a Formula 1 car that didn't have a big enough fuel tank and a sports car that wouldn't turn, so why should we suddenly expect he was going to create magic?" said one team principal who requested anonymity.

It should be noted that Wirth designs and components have won several sports car championships for Honda.

A.J. Foyt weighed in with this theory: "I think the engine companies should build engines and the car company should build the car parts," said Super Tex.

"It's not an HPD problem, it's a Nick Wirth problem," added Rahal.

Honda drivers aren't uniform in their critique other than to mostly agree it's the aero package and not the horsepower.

"Driveability," replied Rahal when asked what one ingredient he needs most. "It's so pitch sensitive and hard to predict, especially at a place that's bumpy. On ovals our kits are just too draggy."

Hunter-Reay said he thought he drove an almost perfect practice lap Friday only to come in and learn he was a second and a half off the quick time. "That's pretty discouraging," said the 2013 IndyCar champ. "But it's not all Honda – as a team, we're doing a terrible job."

Cannon offered another view. "It's hard to point your finger at one thing but Honda's kits look like a box while Chevrolet is elegant."

The real dilemma is what to do. In NASCAR, Honda would have already been thrown some kind of a technical bone to try and even things out but Chevrolet doesn't deserve to be punished for doing a better job. Just like Honda didn't deserve what happened at Indianapolis qualifying.

"It hurts to get beat but I don't like managed competition," said Eriksen, who added he was still unhappy about the last-second changes in qualifying at Indy because ostensibly Chevrolet couldn't keep its cars on the ground. "We didn't have a problem with flying cars (at Indy) yet we were prevented from showing what we were capable of doing in qualifying because of Chevy's issues."

The effect of Honda's struggles is already being felt, as one team owner said his sponsor wondered why it should stay if it didn't have a chance at winning.

And, Chevrolet's domination could also be harmful to the long-term health of the series. Everyone feels like Honda is coming back for the 100th Indianapolis 500 next May but, beyond that, nothing is certain. If Honda were to leave after next year, General Motors has no interest in being a spec engine so it kind of needs its lone rival to get competitive.

Eriksen didn't say if Wirth was being replaced but his two toughest jobs right now are convincing his teams to stay and that improvements are coming.

"We've got some multiple-year team contracts but we're not going to force anybody to stay if they don't want to be here," he continued. "Our job right now is to show we have potential to win to provide confidence to our teams and their sponsors."

"But we are limited to what we have homologated for this season, so our next opportunity for a step forward in aero performance is 2016. We've got the option to redesign three legality boxes and we must choose those properly for best effect."

It's not an insurmountable advantage, just a couple tenths here and there, but that adds up over the course of a race. "Did Honda do a bad job?" said Cannon. "No, Chevy just did a really good one."

Honda hopes for blue skies ahead (although dark skies appear to be its #1 ally right now), but Eriksen knows the manufacturer he's worked for the past 24 years always seems to battle back.

"We've been through tougher times than this," he said. "In 1994 we didn't even qualify at Indianapolis and then we came back strong in 1995, so we are confident that the much smaller gap in performance we see now can be bridged through our continued efforts. "