24/05/2019
NEWS STORY
Following a difficult start to the season which has seen Renault take a step backwards, Renault boss, Cyril Abiteboul, says that a fundamental issue with the power unit has been resolved and the spec-2 unit introduced in Spain is now a match for its rivals.
"There will be another step from this weekend onwards," he told reporters in Monaco, "so basically we are back to the competitiveness level of the engine at the season start, which was really strong.
"From our analysis we see we are now the same level as Ferrari and Mercedes in the race, and behind Ferrari in qualifying," he added.
The Frenchman revealed that Nico Hulkenberg's retirement in Bahrain was down to a conrod failure which resulted in a significant lack of power in the subsequent races. The spec-2 unit was introduced in Spain but as the French manufacturer continued to assess the unit there remained restrictions which continued to compromise the power available.
"In five weeks we managed to identify the problem, come up with a new design, source new parts, test the parts, sign off parts on complete cycles, and build new engines in enough quantity for ourselves and McLaren in time for Spain," he said.
Abiteboul admits that in its quest to find more power, Renault had allowed reliability to become an issue.
"This winter we were given the opportunity to properly focus on power gain, and competitiveness. What it meant was we consciously decided to focus on performance to the detriment of reliability," he said. "It means that a number of engines that should have been used on the dyne to secure reliability were actually used to develop performance. So what it meant was a very good start in terms of engine power, but reliability that was below standard.
"We are committed by Paul Ricard to have all the problems and all the delays that have been hurting us at the start of the season sorted out," he insisted. "Our collective response to the situation is to come up with sufficient lap time improvement to put us clear of the midfield, which was our target for the season."