Renault’s Formula 1 team will remain in the sport despite the carmaker announcing plans to make €2 billion (£1.8bn) in savings over the next three years.
Interim chief executive Clotilde Delbos said “we confirm that we intend to stay in Formula 1” during a conference call today, according to Reuters.The news follows the FIA’s announcement on Wednesday that extensive new measures to cut F1 costs over the coming seasons had been approved.
“The new regulations, new cap in term of investments, because we had less investment than some of our competitors who are spending a lot of money, so F1, we are here, and we stay in Formula 1,” said Delbos.
Renault’s commitment to Formula 1 has varied since it first entered the world championship in 1977. Having failed to win the championship with its pioneering turbo-charged cars, Renault first pulled out of the sport in 1985, though it remained as an engine supplier.
It enjoyed great success powering Williams and Benetton to championships in the nineties, then left the sport again. It returned once more in 2002, and this time succeeded in winning the championship outright as a constructor, in 2005 and 2006.
In 2009, following its implication in the Crashgate scandal, Renault pulled its works team out of F1 once more, but again remained as an engine supplier. Red Bull won four consecutive champions with its engines over the following seasons.
Renault returned to Formula 1 as a works team again in 2016. It rose to fourth in the constructors’ championship in 2018, but slipped to fifth last season. Star driver Daniel Ricciardo, who it lured away from Red Bull in 2018, will leave the team at the end of this year to join McLaren.
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bosyber (@bosyber)
29th May 2020, 10:35
Hm, with the McLaren staff cuts, now this, one has to slightly wonder whether Ricciardo has again made a move at the wrong time there.
Anyway, makes sense I think to have this confirmation (unless they’d think their current car is not at all better than last, costs are there already, and they were always mainly focussed on 2021- now 2020, or 23). Seems the message of F1, but cheaper, while we stay at same budget, worked well enough for HQ. Might also be a bit of pride to see it through be in there, but on the whole, the F1 budget is not the thing that would make or brake future Renault success anyway, and now the message is not so bad when they have to announce restructuring and job-losses in the rest of the company, because it also saves highly skilled work, I think.
Fer no.65 (@fer-no65)
29th May 2020, 10:44
@bosyber well, they are confirming their intention to continue. That does not mean that if things stay this bad they won’t pull the plug. McLaren is not going to leave F1, because that’s their main reason for existing. Renault sells cars, F1 is just a marketing tool for them which can easily cease to exist like they’ve done it plenty of times.
bosyber (@bosyber)
29th May 2020, 12:32
@fer-no65 it is relevant though to realise that Renault themselves do not see themselves as ‘just a car manufacturer’ though, they see themselves as a brand with a strong motorsports heritage – that’s why in the 80ties they got into F1 with a new Turbo until everyone saw that was the way to go, and why they made that wonderful Espace with the williams WDC winning engine in the 90ties, and why the Singapore thing hurt them a lot as well as why they did end up returning, not wanting to give up after the trashing they got from 2014 with Red Bul.
Euro Brun (@eurobrun)
29th May 2020, 12:56
Its been a brutal week…
BasCB (@bascb)
29th May 2020, 13:29
This will be a very welcome confirment of being on the right path for Liberty I think. Not just because it keeps at least one car brand attached, but especially because it gives a more solid base in regards to engines.
With Honda not too unlikely to walk out after 2021 and Mercedes uncertain, at least they now know that there will be 2 engine suppliers to build on. When Mercedes cuts down to being just an engine supplier (and maybe sponsoring their current team as a semi-works unit?) that would mean that we at least have choice of engines until 2035 when they want to have new units.
Sensord4notbeingafanboi (@peartree)
29th May 2020, 18:35
thank you french people. Abiteboul keep trying!