Renault in high confidence mood!

By role
March 16 2004

The Renault F1 team is loking forward to the upcoming Malaysian Grand Prix with the hopes to close the gap with Ferrari and be able to challenge for the win. Last year Fernando Alonso finished 3rd after setting the pole even after battling flu symptoms and a failling gearbox.

This year, with the confidence of already having a podium in the bag and the improved performance of the R24 over the old R23, the team believes they can challenge for the win and close the gap to leaders Ferrari.

Technical Director Bob Bell believes that one of the key matters is to qualify high on the grid:

"It will be crucial, and we certainly need to focus on our qualifying pace to bring it up to the level of our race speed. Firstly, we will look to setting the car up in such a way that it maintains the benefits of its pace on long runs while exploiting the first lap qualifying performance. Secondly, we will be able to do more with the engine to manage this gap later in the season as we get more power - we were slightly conservative from this perspective in Melbourne, and will be looking to push the envelope as the year goes on." He says.

With such long straights and the hairpins the Malaysian track requires of a very balanced car with extreme good braking:

"The performance of the R24 is very good under braking. The car has very good grip and is extremely stable aerodynamically. When braking hard from over 300kph, a car undergoes dramatic changes in attitude, particularly during the initial phases, and it is important that the aerodynamics can handle this without undue disturbance. This was certainly the case last year, and there is no reason to think it would have changed on the R24." He adds.

Bell is looking forward to build on the good performance at Australia:

"We were very heartened by our performance in Australia, and I think we have the potential for a good, solid result in Sepang. The circuit suits the strengths of our package and while Ferrari caught everybody out in Australia, I am sure we can close the gap at this race. A question mark remains over tyre performance, but we will have a clearer picture once we have run in the hotter conditions. In general, the level of confidence within the team is very high right now." He concludes.