Motorsport TechnologyWhen one thinks of Renault, the mind invariably conjures images of Rene Arnoux in his famous duel with Gilles Villeneuve in Dijon back in 1979 and the great Alain Prost winning nine races with the team in the early 1980s.
Yet most current fans of the sport will best remember the glory years of 2005 and 2006 when Fernando Alonso took on the mighty Michael Schumacher and won the French marque successive drivers’ titles and the first ever for a French team.
Controversy followed in 2008 after the team was deemed to have deliberately affected the result of the Singapore Grand Prix when Nelson Piquet Jr. crashed to bring about a Safety Car situation to aid Alonso to victory.
Returning to the sport as a team under its own name and a full manufacturer from 2016, the once iconic flash of the yellow Renault is back again. And with the highly-rated duo of Daniel Ricciardo and Nico Hulkenberg piloting the cars for 2019, it will be interesting indeed to see if the team can once again return to the front end of the grid.
STRENGTHS: A manufacturer team in its own right with the workforce and budget to match. In the charismatic Ricciardo and unflappable Hulkenberg, Renault looks to have a pairing to deliver consistent results.
WEAKNESSES: It just hasn’t clicked for Renault in recent years, for whatever reason. Does not appear to have been able to develop a Powertrain to match the might of Mercedes and Ferrari.
Craig Scarborough
Fraser Masefield