Is the Leadership Behind Renault’s Poor F1 Result?

Renault F1 says it lacked the “force” to make the most of its £15million investment in its Enstone base and in improving its technical development.

This happened despite the recruitment of a multi-time race winner in Daniel Ricciardo. In the wake of completing P4 in the 2018 Constructors’ Championship, 2019 end up being a stage back. Renault F1 which supplies the engine to the McLaren showed signs of improvement of them to take that spot, while the French producer had to agree to P5. The team experienced trouble taking full advantage of its updates in 2019. Especially one it brought to its home race in Paul Ricard. That provoked a significant inward survey of the association, which concluded Renault required some rebuilding. Just as rearranging staff around, it has contracted previous McLaren engineer Pat Fry for a senior job.

Renault F1 managing director Cyril Abiteboul said a key exercise Renault F1 had learned was the requirement for more grounded bearing on the specialized front. He further added that there were different variables having an effect on everything.

Abiteboul said the French Grand Prix redesign disillusionment featured an idea issue with its car that couldn’t be relieved during the season. It opened the entryway for McLaren to update it for fourth in the constructors’ title.

2019 Season for Renault F1

2019 season was a mere disappointment for Renault F1 team. The team finished in the 5th position. McLaren which procures its engine from Renault F1 secured the 4th position. As the team is struggling with pace and aerodynamics, the team’s PU department head, Remi Taffin said that he is confident that only Ferrari F1 is ahead of Renault F1 in terms of engine performance. In addition to this, he also said that both Mercedes F1 and Honda’s power units are behind Renault’s.

Cyril Abiteboul on problems with Renault F1

Team principal Cyril Abiteboul has admitted the team was “weak” when it came to technical leadership. The team failed to truly harness their £15million of investment.

“It looks like we were missing something in the technical leadership of the team, in the ability to pull all the resources that we put together,” he said

“We talk a lot about figures, and headline numbers like 750 people in Enstone now. It’s huge, and there have been lots of investments: £15 million of investment. But you know, all of that needs to be driven by a force. And I felt that, and we felt that, we were a bit weak in technical leadership. Therefore, that led to the recruitment of Pat. I think in the first part of this season we had a decent car. But it was not very visible, because we did not manage to get the results or score the points that we could have at the time. Given the theoretical competitiveness of our car against our competitors. There were different types of reasons for that: reliability, the engine, operation at the track, a bit of pitstop, and a bit of strategy.” Abiteboul said.

He further added “Plus a bit of drivers, also particularly Daniel [Ricciardo] getting used to the car. That, unfortunately, cost us some points at the time where we were in decent shape. When we were expecting to bring the car to the next level, it didn’t really work. So we discovered that there was a sort of limit for the development of the car given the choices that were made in terms of the overall philosophy. That was the story of the second part of the season.”