A peek inside a Formula One race shop
VIRY-CHATILLON, FRANCE— There are few “sanctorums” that are more “sanctum” in the automobile business than a Formula One race shop.
In a sport with millions of dollars on the line (or into the guard rail), where success differs from failure by hundredths of a second in every corner and all cars are built to a strictly enforced set of rules, secrets are tightly held.
Every team is searching for that advantage, unfair or otherwise, and that fairness is adjudicated by those same rule makers.
So, when the invitation came to visit the Renault Formula One race engine shop in this suburb to the south of Paris, I wasn’t likely to turn it down, even if I assumed we would be pretty restricted about what we could see, photograph and write about.
As it turned out, our hosts were remarkably forthcoming.
OK, so the cynical Formula One race fan might well argue that Renault’s placement near the back of the pack since the company took over the struggling Lotus team in late 2015 suggests they have no secrets worth hiding.
But again, the margins are so tiny here.
And rather like Ross Brawn did when he took over the Honda F1 team in 2008 — stopping development of the existing car in midseason to focus all his efforts on the following year — that’s effectively what Renault did midway through the 2016 season.
Renault drivers Kevin Magnussen and Jolyon Palmer knew they had to play around with the Manors and Saubers for the remainder of 2016 in hopes that the 2017 car would be more competitive.
At least they have one data point that suggests this is the right strategy — the Brawn cars qualified and finished one-two in the first race of 2009, and Jenson Button won his World Championship that year. And the Brawn team went on to become the Mercedes-Benz team, which dominates F1today.
Not that Renault Sport Racing’s chief technical officer Bob Bell is exactly expecting a championship this coming season.
“Formula One is engine, driver, chassis and aerodynamics,” he notes.
“Our engines are already racewinners and are regularly on the podium,” he notes, referring to the fact that Red Bull also uses Renault engines.
A transport truckload of rule changes is coming for 2017, and the team is working hard on them.
“We are building our team of technical talent and fabricators,” Bell adds.
Among other things, last year, Renault brought the engineering of many of the electronic control unit components in-house instead of outsourcing them.
“Our goal is podium finishes in 2018,” Bell says, “with a realistic chance at a championship maybe two to three years after that.”
He knows his team has a lot of work ahead of them, and the teams that are also ahead of them on the track, notably Mercedes-Benz, Ferrari and Red Bull, aren’t exactly chopped liver, and won’t be standing still.
But Renault has been a winner in the past, and they know the magnitude of the challenge and seem prepared to dedicate the necessary resources.
The engines are designed and built here; the chassis and assembly takes place in Enstone, England. The distance both in kilometres and culture doesn’t seem to be an issue, as the two branches of the team are in constant electronic contact.
A Formula One engine is an immensely complex piece of engineering. The rule makers decided in 2009 to add “KERS” — Kinetic Energy Recovery System — to the 2.4-litre, V8 engine, to recapture energy lost in braking to charge a battery which would power an electric motor to add a short-lived boost of some 80 horsepower at the touch of a button on the steering wheel.
In 2014, in an attempt to make the cars more “relevant” to the real world, they reduced displacement — 1.5-litre turbocharged V6 engines instead of 2.4-litre V8s — and the cars would need to complete each Grand Prix using no more than 100 kilograms of fuel.
And, they mandated a full, twostage hybrid system, using two Motor-Generator Units (MGU). The MGU-H captures heat from the turbo, converts it into electricity and stores it in the battery. It also controls turbocharger r.p.m. to reduce turbo lag and improve driveability.
The second MGU-K recaptures kinetic energy from the brakes and also directs additional torque from that battery to the motor to help power the rear wheels.
It’s all managed by an incredibly complex computer system which has to exist in the harshest environment imaginable for an electronic component, with all the heat and vibration of a race car.
Now, the whole idea of fuel-efficient race cars seems a bit pointless, especially since these cars are flown all across the world several times during the season and every 747 cargo jet flight probably consumes more fuel than all cars do during the entire series.
Not to mention the question of how relevant can 350 km/h, oneseat open-wheel race cars ever be to the real world. Still, it provides better optics. As for the drivers, the Formula One driver lineup became even more of a yard sale than usual when 2016 champion Nico Rosberg announced his retirement just five days after securing his first and now presumably only title.
In the ensuing melee, many drivers changed hats. Er, helmets.
Renault feels they need a “development” driver and a “race winner,” not that those two characteristics are mutually exclusive.
They felt Magnussen was the more aggressive of last year’s pair, while Palmer was more precise.
Perhaps this helps explain why they signed German Nico Hulkenberg to a multi-year contract, which left Magnussen out of a ride; he has subsequently joined the Americanowned Haas team.
Hulkenberg has won championships at every level of racing he has competed in except, of course, Formula One, where he has been a regular since 2010 with Williams, Sauber and Force India. He has shown good speed, but has never really been in a car with a realistic chance of winning.
So the Renaults should be decently fast in 2017, well-driven and with the new rules somewhat levelling the playing field, it should make them more competitive.
Formula One racing isn’t just about automotive engineering; it is also about marketing.
Renault is using its F1exposure to make the brand more familiar in
“Our goal is podium finishes in 2018, with a realistic chance at a championship maybe two to three years after that.” BOB BELL RENAULT SPORT RACING’S CTO
markets where it isn’t as wellknown, such as China.
The Infiniti side of the house is leveraging the race experience of its corporate sibling to tie into the hybrid systems in its road cars.
The branding term everyone tosses around is “Technology Partner.”
For road cars, hybrids are largely about optimizing range, fuel economy and emissions. For race cars, it’s more about performance.
But both disciplines involve getting the maximum amount of energy from a given amount of fuel.
In the final analysis, racing is entertainment, just like any professional sport.
Making it more competitive should make it more interesting, and that will be the challenge for the new ownership of this circus, which begins anew in March in Australia.
As a lifelong Maple Leafs fan, I’ve got used to the “wait till next year” mantra.
In Formula One, “next year” starts in March.