Renault engine quadruple in Bahrain
After the hat-trick achieved by the Mercedes team in China, it's Renault's turn to shine in Bahrain, with a quartet achieved by Vettel, Räikkönen, Grosjean, and Webber.
If the Chinese Grand Prix had rather turned to the advantage of cars powered by a Mercedes engine, the Bahrain Grand Prix was dominated by cars equipped with a Renault engine. The French engine manufacturer even achieved a quadruple, its first in 15 years, as Rémi Taffin, head of track operations at Renault Sport F1, stated: «It was a fantastic race for Renault Sport F1, with the top four positions entirely occupied by drivers powered by the Renault RS27 engine. It’s the first time we’ve occupied the three podium steps since the Monaco Grand Prix in 2010, and the first time in 15 years that we’ve achieved a quadruple!»
Even though the Sakhir circuit, located in the desert, offers rather hostile conditions for F1 engines, Renault managed to handle and brilliantly rise to the challenge posed by the Bahrain Grand Prix according to Rémi Taffin: The Bahrain International Circuit represents a unique challenge; it’s dusty, very arid, and the tire wear is high, which means fuel consumption can be sometimes unpredictable. Today, we also experienced weather conditions that we hadn’t seen over the weekend, and there was even a bit of rain in the air before the start, which added an additional variable. This makes it one of the toughest races of the year for the engines and is an important testament to the hard work of everyone at Viry-Châtillon, especially after a difficult start to the season. It is also a demonstration of the professionalism of our track teams who manage this competition between “Renault” teams so well.
If everything went well for the Red Bull Racing and Lotus F1 Team, the day was not entirely satisfactory for Renault, as while the Caterham drivers performed well, the outcome of the Williams-Renault drivers’ race ended with two retirements – though not engine-related: Caterham once again demonstrated good pace, with Vitaly battling with the Toro Rosso. It’s a shame that Heikki couldn’t take advantage of his excellent starting position, but the overall performance of the team is improving and we are now returning to more conventional European circuits with some developments in the pipeline. Unfortunately, the 150th race of the Williams-Renault partnership did not go exactly as planned, but the race pace was once again very good and if Pastor hadn’t experienced that puncture we could have had another Renault-powered car in the points. We now have three weeks ahead of us before the Spanish GP and a test in Mugello, so there are plenty of opportunities to continue this momentum.
