Renault held internal review before US fightback
ByAutoSport
Published 23/10/2018 at 11:07 GMT
Renault Sport Formula 1 president Jerome Stoll says the French manufacturer undertook an internal review after struggling in recent races to help it bounce back at Austin last weekend.
Eurosport
Image credit: Eurosport
Renault has come under increasing pressure from Haas in the battle for fourth place in the world championship, with the exclusion of Romain Grosjean at Monza, which remains under appeal, giving it some breathing space.
Renault scored only 10 points in the first five races after the summer break, but at the US Grand Prix Nico Hulkenberg and Carlos Sainz finished sixth and seventh and best of the rest.
The subsequent disqualification of Kevin Magnussen from ninth place further helped to boost its advantage over the US-owned team to a healthy 22 points with three races remaining.
"We needed these points, definitely," Stoll told Autosport. "We had in the last two or three races some slow-down in our performance, but now everybody is back in the race.
"The remobilisation of everyone was necessary. We had internal meetings in order to motivate everybody towards this objective, and I'm very happy that eventually delivered what we were expecting.
"Race after race we have to confirm that we are on our target. For me the objective of the year was P4.
"We were in a very good position in the first part of the season, and suddenly we realised that we had to remain mobilised, all the team, and this race has demonstrated that it's possible to remain on the objective that we have."
Stoll cautioned that the team can't afford to back off as the end of the season approaches.
"When you look at the differences between the teams, it's very, very small," he said. "We have to be careful not to suddenly relax.
"The mobilisation is absolutely necessary for everybody until the last race. We have to remain motivated and concentrated. It's not done."
Stoll is confident Renault's 2019 power unit package will be a big step forward as the team aims to continue to move towards the front of the field.
"We know that we have a big improvement for next year with the engine," he said. "Everybody at Viry is working on this specific topic.
"The first result that we got from the bench is very positive, so we are confident that our journey is still developing as we were expecting.
"We know that it's a long journey, it's race after race, season after season. For the time being we are very happy with today, but we have to keep concentrating.
"If we want to beat Red Bull, better for them to have another engine [Honda] than our engine!
"The relationship with Red Bull was normal, I would say. They are very demanding, and we have to deliver what they expect."
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