Renault experienced "magic breakthrough" with Baku upgrade

Renault’s better reliability has given the team the ability to push the car harder and take a step forward in its performance. The French manufacturer had a troubled pre-season and pushed back an engine upgrade earlier this year due to concerns about how long it would last.

Max Verstappen is the most recent driver powered by a Renault engine to suffer issues. The Dutchman retired in Canada and Azerbaijan through no fault of his own. Recent engine failures are to do with older parts before the team knew how to solve the issue. Renault introduced new engine modes and settings in Baku for its works and customer teams, which delivered a gain of around 0.2 seconds.

Engine technical director Remi Taffin said: "If you are on the back foot and have to turn things down electronically, then you can move things up quite easily when you have the reliability back. That is what we did [in Baku] - and it sometimes feels like it is a bit of magic stuff. The second part of the season we will be looking to build on the right level of reliability to take the most out of the engine.

"That also means the most out of the power unit, so we can get more electrical energy out of the energy store. There is still a big focus in trying to follow our road map and make sure that next year's engine is there. As it is an engine that is close to this one, it is easier to transfer ideas from one to the other."

Sian Williams