With his team failing to secure a single point in the first three races of the 2016 F1 season, managing director Cyril Abiteboul isn’t looking to make up any excuses.
As of right now, Renault stands at zero points in the Constructors’ Championship, being one of three teams that have yet to finish in the top 10 in any of the past three races.
The other two teams are Sauber and Manor, though with the middle of the pack getting a lot stronger this year, Renault might be in for a very long season.
“Right now we need to focus on the car and there is no excuse to find,” said Abiteboul in an interview with Autosport. “OK, the best line is because we started late and it’s a car that was designed for a Mercedes engine, but that is absolutely no excuse for the lack of progress from that point onwards.”
While it’s true that the former Lotus car was designed to run on a Mercedes power unit, it’s quite clear that the current Renault engine isn’t all that bad since Red Bull have already managed to make good use of it.
“We have no excuse for what we did on the engine, and today we have no excuse for what we’re doing on the chassis. So let’s look forward,” added the Renault exec.
Unfortunately for his team, they’ve also struggled with getting the best out of the new Pirelli tires.
“We need to improve our understanding of the tires. I’m seeing that when we don’t get any running on Friday, it’s hurting us a lot on Sunday. We saw that in China.”
Tires and engines aside, the Renault RS16 obviously needs further development chassis-wise and from an aerodynamic standpoint – whether that’s going to come this season, remains to be seen.
What’s certain is that Red Bull’s promising start should empower Renault’s belief that they could also achieve more if they focused their attention on figuring how the car itself could make better use of the power unit.
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