While Aston Martin is looking to upgrade its car in Hungary, Honda's much anticipated upgrade won't come until after the summer break.

"We're predicting a large step, but I'm reluctant to put specific numbers out there," said Adrian Newey of the first upgrade to the AMR26. "The main structural elements will remain the same," he admitted, "the chassis and gearbox architecture don't fundamentally change, but we've taken weight out of both, which required re-homologating and crash testing the forward chassis.

"The front suspension is unchanged," he added. "The rear suspension is slightly revised. We've developed a new nose and substantially revised aerodynamic surfaces. So, while the core structure is similar, it's a big aerodynamic package coupled with significant weight reduction. The target is to get very close to the weight limit."

That is in three weeks in Hungary, however, Fernando Alonso and Lance Stroll will have to wait a further five weeks for the new engine.

"I kept saying summer," Honda's trackside general manager and chief engineer Shintaro Orihara told reporters ahead of this weekend's race at Silverstone, "maybe that's a boring answer. So, I'll say our target is the Netherlands, he added.

"We are working hard to complete our job list to achieve bringing a new power unit to the Netherlands. That's our target.

"Our priority is to focus internally," he continued. "Our focus is to improve engine performance. So we are working on the combustion chamber shape, and we are also modifying the chamber.

"We will change the combustion chamber shape to improve our combustion performance. We are also working to reduce friction by modifying our lubrication system.

"That is what we are working on now, and, of course, we are also trying to improve durability because, if we increase performance, we need to increase durability. We still haven't quite completed it, but we are working hard to achieve this by the Netherlands."

More than any other, the Japanese manufacturer is benefitting from the controversial ADUO system, and while he was unwilling to give away how much, Orihara admits that the scope to upgrade was significant.

"I can't explain in detail how many, but we have a big list," he said. "So we will bring many updates to the Netherlands. I can't say how many but, quite big parts we will modify.

"The new power unit is purely focused on improving performance, but we changed the combustion characteristic; we need to optimise our data setting again to optimise drivability. So now we are working to improve drivability in this power unit. And that methodology will be carried over to the new power unit to optimise setting."

However, we also keen to suggest that the upgrade is no magic bullet.

"I know the number from dyno, but I can't disclose the number. But we are aiming to get some reasonable big step rather than bring small step.

"I would say there is no magic in Formula 1," he added. "So I don't think we're going to catch up to, let's say Mercedes or RBPT by one step, but we are going to bring some reasonable big step.

"The performance development is step by step. So the Netherlands is the first step to bring some reasonable step, but we need another further step in the future to catch up with the top competitor."