We can be just as competitive in Spa - Bell
The ING Renault F1 Team looks forward to round twelve of the season, the Belgian Grand Prix at the historic venue of Spa-Francorchamps. The team’s Technical Director, Bob Bell, looks forward to this weekend’s race.
"It was good to be back in the points, but overall we were disappointed as we had hoped for more from the weekend and believe we could have been fighting for a podium. Fernando was quick in practice and we were quite confident that he had the potential to get on the front row in qualifying, but unfortunately he had a brake problem which meant he started eighth. To make up two places in the race on a street circuit where overtaking is difficult was probably as much as we could have hoped for from the race."
Romain Grosjean made his debut for the team – how did you assess his performance?"Romain did an excellent job during his first Grand Prix. He settled in very well with the team, has a good relationship with the engineers and was sensible and consistent, which is as much as we could expect of anybody making their debut with little Formula One experience. I’m sure he’ll continue to mature and progress with each of the remaining races."
Tell us about the technical challenge of Spa and how you expect the R29 to perform..."It’s a technical circuit with a wide range of challenges: both high and low-speed. We haven’t got the quickest car on the grid, but that’s because the R29 is still missing a little bit of performance in all areas rather than a specific weakness that is likely to show up at certain circuits. Based on our performance in recent races, I’d expect to see a similar level of competitiveness in Spa."
What new developments will be on the car this weekend and is the team planning to use KERS?"We’re always adding new developments and for the next couple of races we’ll be using a low downforce package on the car. As for KERS, we don’t plan to use it in Spa, but we’re considering it for Monza as we believe it will provide a real advantage there."
How is the team balancing the development of the R29 with next year’s car?"Pushing the development of the R29 late into the season while also working on the R30 is stretching our resources to the limit. We’re managing things on a week-by-week basis and gradually allocating more and more resources onto next year’s car whist still pushing hard to improve the R29. We’re fortunate that the aerodynamic regulations next year remain the same and we can transfer what we learn from the R30 onto the current car, but it’s fair to say that the majority of the effort is now going into next year’s car."
