Renault suffered in Melbourne

Renault Sport F1 Team came very close to entering the points for the first round of the 2017 World Championship yesterday in Australia with Nico Hulkenberg. However, the German was unable to rise to the level of his replacement at Force India, Esteban Ocon, author of the decisive overtake for the last point against the McLaren MCL32 Fernando Alonso.

“I had a very positive final stint on ultrasoft tires, comments the winner of the 24 Hours of Le Mans 2015. The car improved with each pass, but it was not enough to gain another place.

My battle with Ocon and Alonso was very fun. I benefited from double aspiration, so I gave it my all by switching to 'attack' mode with the DRS. It was quite spectacular and must have looked beautiful from the outside. »

With the abandonment of Jolyon Palmer, victim of a brake problem, the result underlines, according to Cyril Abiteboul, general manager of Renault Sport Racing, underlines the team's imperfect preparation against its rivals. “This first Grand Prix under the new regulations delivered several lessons, explains the Frenchman.

Our result shows that we were not as well prepared as our competitors and our lack of mileage, both in pre-season testing and this weekend, made us suffer today.

We learned that in this new era for F1, everything has to be perfect as it is so hard to gain places on track. We had to be better at the start, in the execution of our strategy, in our pit stops, but also in our set-up and balance of the car. »

The points at each race in the viewfinder

The French manager, however, admits to having some positive indicators consistent with Renault's expectations for this 2017 season. “Even though there have been very few clean air laps to demonstrate it, we believe our car-engine-driver combination puts us in the group where we expect to fight.

On each meeting, we should be able to play Q3 on Saturday then the points on Sunday. We look to the future and our main priority for Shanghai is to improve our reliability. We should then emerge stronger. »

Discover the full report and analysis of the Australian Grand Prix, produced by our special correspondents in Melbourne, in issue 2107 of AUTOhebdo, available this evening in digital version and this Wednesday on newsstands.