Renault catch-up complete

Renault believe that they have now finished their early season catch-up programme.

Renault powered teams have been in catch-up mode during the opening six races of the season after the engine manufacturer was caught on the back foot during the winter.

Problems with the new hybrid engine saw the Renault teams struggle for mileage during winter testing.

Whilst Mercedes had completed 1,323km in Spain at the first winter test, Red Bull had completed just 90km. The least mileage run by any team in attendance at the test [Lotus did not run].

At this stage, the other Renault powered teams had also struggled, sister team Toro Rosso for example had only completed 140km more, whilst Caterham achieved a further 94km.

During the first Bahrain test, Caterham completed 1,295km, Toro Rosso 712km, Lotus 568km, while Red Bull ran a slightly improved 594km.

But once again in comparison to Mercedes, they were all lagging behind with the German manufacturer running 1,613km and that wasn’t even the furthest distance run with Williams Mercedes completing 1,654km.

The second winter test in Bahrain showed slight improvements, but it was all too little too late as far as the teams were concerned with Red Bull Racing being particularly scathing.

After the three tests were completed Red Bull Racing achieved a test mileage total of of 1,621km. In comparison, Mercedes completing 4,732km.

It’s quite simple really: we’ve had a massive engine regulation change and Renault have turned up and they weren’t as ready as some of their competitors were,’

‘[Renault] were the guys who pushed very hard for this regulation change, so one would have thought that they’d have been the most prepared for it. Red Bull Team Principal Christian Horner told the press last month.

With Red Bull Racing and Renault winning the last four consecutive drivers and constructors titles the pressure was clearly on and the engine manufacturer now feels like they are close to a recovery.

‘At the start of the season we said that we would be out of recovery mode and back on track from the Canadian Grand Prix onwards, In the last four races we’ve introduced several new upgrades and we will complete the process in Montreal, effectively giving us the first full opportunity to see where we are versus the competition.’ Renault Sport F1’s Head of Track Operations Remi Taffin told Sky Sports.

‘We have several new parts to debut here, primarily designed to give us greater reliability. As in previous races we have more upgrades to software to further enhance driveability and energy management. Additionally we have investigated the reasons for the failures in Monaco and have taken measures to ensure they do not reoccur.

He added: ‘Even though we know that the competition is extremely strong, we go to Montreal in an optimistic frame of mind as we always do our best to win on track. Realistically we have to be humble, but it will still be a very good test of how far we’ve come since the difficult winter testing period and how much work remains to be done.’