11/11/2017
NEWS STORY
Whatever one might think of Toro Rosso's impending partnership with Honda, it's fair to say that many at Faenza, not least the drivers, will not be sorry to see the back of Renault.
From the outset, Pierre Gasly and Brendon Hartley have been hit with penalties, and again this weekend the rookie duo appear condemned to start from the back of the grid.
Both began the Interlagos weekend with 10-place grid penalties after the team fitted new MHU-Hs ahead of the opening session. However, between them the pair managed just seven laps in FP1 as they encountered further issues, leaving Gasly facing another 15-place demotion and Hartley likely to follow suit. This, of course, follows an equally fraught weekend in Mexico, when Gasly wasn't even able to take part in qualifying.
However, Renault boss, Cyril Abiteboul, believes the issues are car specific.
"We are not happy with that situation, and we take it very seriously," he told Motorsport.com. "Toro Rosso has suffered in the last couple of events much more issues than other teams, and obviously when it's happening, because of the regulations, and because of parts availability and production lead time, that's causing issues.
"We do have a little bit of a concern about the way that our engine is operated in the Toro Rosso car," he admitted, "which may explain why we have had so many issues coming from Toro Rosso specifically. There are never coincidences in this sport."
The Frenchman admits that the situation is not helped by the demand at its engine HQ in Viry for new and 'reconditioned' parts.
"We were not assuming that we would have the issues that we have had, and therefore at some point you have to be managing with the parts you have," he said. "It's only been two weeks since Mexico, we sent the parts back to Viry, we worked on a bank holiday in order to sign off as many of the parts that had seen some issues as possible.
"With the logistics and the timing issues there's a limit to what we can do and the number of new parts that we can bring, obviously," he admitted. "It's a snowball effect. Once that snowball starts to roll, it's very difficult to stop it. We are doing our best in order to contain it, but there will be a limit in the way we can mitigate the consequences of what has happened, which we are still trying to understand."
Check out our Saturday gallery from Interlagos, here.