70 GP RACING APRIL 2020
RACING POINT V RENAULT
THEY’VE GOT HISTORY
July 2018
Force India goes into administration.Renault is among threeteams that raise
objectionstopotential saletoconsortium ledbyLawrenceStroll.Renault
team bossCyril Abiteboul denies this is an attempttoblock the transfer
of points and prize money as well as assets, sayingRenault simply “wants
reassurances” thatForce India will not end up becoming a Mercedes B-team.August 2018
In the continued absence of the unanimous approval required from other
teamstotransfer ownership ofForce India, LawrenceStroll’s consortium
starts a new company – RacingPoint – and acquiresForce India’s assets. The
‘new’team is allowed enter the championship, starting again fromzero points- but only after a last-minute deal on the eve of the Belgian Grand Prix. The
moveslashes theteam’s prize money income.
October 2019
Renault is disqualified in Japan and its steering wheels impoundedbythe FIA
after RacingPoint protestsover an alleged illegal brake-bias adjustment
system. “They could haveasked the FIAtoissue atechnical directive, or asked
them questions outside a race weekend,” rages Abiteboul. “This is the way it
is always done. But RacingPoint violated the agreement and prepared a
12-page dossier, waitingfor the right momenttowin back points from us.”February 2020
RacingPoint’s RP20 emergesattesting bearing a strongresemblancetothe
2019 title-winning Mercedes.Renaultexecutivedirector MarcinBudkowski calls
it “a slightly concerningevolutionfor the sport”. RumourscirculateRenault and
McLaren areplanningtoprotest the RP20at the season-opening race.of the car itincreases the working
area ofthe di ffuser section between
the rear wheels, acomponent
subject tovery ti ghtly prescribed
physical dimensions.It also offers
advantages in managing the
aerodynamic wake of thetyres.
Aerodynamics being a holistic
process, though, every other part of
the car must operate in harmony
to maximise its effectiveness.
It took the restof the grid several
seasons to understand the high
rake concept, during which Red
Bull cleaned up in the constructors’
championship. The hybrid era
changed that, making aero less of
a performance differentiator, and
Mercedesfoun d its own path in
managing tyrerelated turbulence
without adopting high rake.
The much wider tyres used in F
since 2 now make mitigating
the effects of their turbulence much
more important, and make it even
less attractive to swap from the
highrake to the lowrake concept
± it means consigning years of
hardearned knowledge to the bin.
But still Racing Point decided to do
it, partly because its cars have been carrying significant compromises since
the location of the suspensionmounting points on the Mercedes gearbox
are optimised forthe lowrake concept.
“It’s something that we’ve been wanting to do for a very long time but
haven’t had the budget to do,” explains Racing Point technical director
Andy Green. “I don’t know what they >the other teams@ have gotto
complain about. What we’ve done is completely legal.
“We couldn’t go this route earlier. 2ur hands were tied financially,
and had been for many years ± we had to carry over a huge amount of
components from one year to the next. And it wasn’t possibleto do a resetlike we’ve done. We didn’t have the
financial resources, we didn’t have
the people, and the manufacturing
capability as well.
“It took from the time Lawrence
and the consortium took over, for
me to explain what wewanted to do
and how we wanted to work, and for
that to be implemented tookquite a
while ± six to nine months.It was a
long process, butone we decided we
were going to doright from thevery
beginning.As soonas we c ame out
of administration, this is what we
were going to do.”
The RP2 uses more Mercedes
suspension components than
the RP , which only employed
Mercedes uprights, but the design
of the springdamper units and
their integration within the chassis
is to Racing Point’s own design.
Likewise, the cooling architecture,
an area pushed to extreme by the
factory teams, uses less complex
hardware and is therefore larger asa
result, requiring bigger intakes and
more space around the sidepods.
So, under the skin the RP2 is
very different from the Mercedes
W it imitates. And there’s no guaranteethe team will be able to
understand and maximise the potential of its new aero concept, though it
now has more time to do so than it originally anticipated. Racing Point’s
original plan was to bring updates to the first race and then perhaps one or
two more upgrade packages before committing fully to 22 development±
its aim was to do a smashandgrab, maximising its points haul early on.
“We were unsure whetherwe were goingto realise the full potential of
what we’ve seen in the simulation,” says Green. “(verything wesee so far
suggests we have transferred across from the modelside to the full side.
“We couldn’t do aslow start and look to upgrade through the season as
we didlast year. That’s notgoing
to be possible. We knew the rest
of the year was going to be very
challenging >in terms of allocating
resources to the 22 project@.”
Given the attenuated nature of
this season, Racing Point’s strategy
may prove to be a prudent one.
And its new car will now havea
longer shelflife, since the new
technical rules due to come in next
year have been deferred until 222.
If the RP2 is as competitive as
everybody thinks, expect the knives
to be out for Racing Point again.The battlefor ‘best ofthe rest’ spotbehind thetop threeteams has become
spicyoff the track as wellas onit over the past couple of seasons...RacingPoint lackedthe budget to fo llow
Mercedes’ rake concept sooner70 GP RACING APRIL 2020
RACING POINT V RENAULT
THEY’VE GOT HISTORY
July 2018
Force India goes into administration.Renault is among threeteams that raise
objectionstopotential saletoconsortium ledbyLawrenceStroll.Renault
team bossCyril Abiteboul denies this is an attempttoblock the transfer
of points and prize money as well as assets, sayingRenault simply “wants
reassurances” thatForce India will not end up becoming a Mercedes B-team.August 2018
In the continued absence of the unanimous approval required from other
teamstotransfer ownership ofForce India, LawrenceStroll’s consortium
starts a new company – RacingPoint – and acquiresForce India’s assets. The
‘new’team is allowed enter the championship, starting again fromzero points- but only after a last-minute deal on the eve of the Belgian Grand Prix. The
moveslashes theteam’s prize money income.
October 2019
Renault is disqualified in Japan and its steering wheels impoundedbythe FIA
after RacingPoint protestsover an alleged illegal brake-bias adjustment
system. “They could haveasked the FIAtoissue atechnical directive, or asked
them questions outside a race weekend,” rages Abiteboul. “This is the way it
is always done. But RacingPoint violated the agreement and prepared a
12-page dossier, waitingfor the right momenttowin back points from us.”February 2020
RacingPoint’s RP20 emergesattesting bearing a strongresemblancetothe
2019 title-winning Mercedes.Renaultexecutivedirector MarcinBudkowski calls
it “a slightly concerningevolutionfor the sport”. RumourscirculateRenault and
McLaren areplanningtoprotest the RP20at the season-opening race.of the car itincreases the working
area ofthe di ffuser section between
the rear wheels, acomponent
subject tovery ti ghtly prescribed
physical dimensions.It also offers
advantages in managing the
aerodynamic wake of thetyres.
Aerodynamics being a holistic
process, though, every other part of
the car must operate in harmony
to maximise its effectiveness.
It took the restof the grid several
seasons to understand the high-
rake concept, during which Red
Bull cleaned up in the constructors’
championship. The hybrid era
changed that, making aero less of
a performance differentiator, and
Mercedesfoun d its own path in
managing tyre-related turbulence
without adopting high rake.
The much wider tyres used in F1
since 2017 now make mitigating
the effects of their turbulence much
more important, and make it even
less attractive to swap from the
high-rake to the low-rake concept- it means consigning years of
hard-earned knowledge to the bin.
But still Racing Point decided to do
it, partly because its cars have been carrying significant compromises since
the location of the suspension-mounting points on the Mercedes gearbox
are optimised forthe low-rake concept.
“It’s something that we’ve been wanting to do for a very long time but
haven’t had the budget to do,” explains Racing Point technical director
Andy Green. “I don’t know what they [the other teams] have gotto
complain about. What we’ve done is completely legal.
“We couldn’t go this route earlier. Our hands were tied financially,
and had been for many years – we had to carry over a huge amount of
components from one year to the next. And it wasn’t possibleto do a reset
like we’ve done. We didn’t have the
financial resources, we didn’t have
the people, and the manufacturing
capability as well.
“It took from the time Lawrence
and the consortium took over, for
me to explain what wewanted to do
and how we wanted to work, and for
that to be implemented tookquite a
while – six to nine months.It was a
long process, butone we decided we
were going to doright from thevery
beginning.As soonas we c ame out
of administration, this is what we
were going to do.”
The RP20 uses more Mercedes
suspension components than
the RP19, which only employed
Mercedes uprights, but the design
of the spring/damper units and
their integration within the chassis
is to Racing Point’s own design.
Likewise, the cooling architecture,
an area pushed to extreme by the
factory teams, uses less complex
hardware and is therefore larger asa
result, requiring bigger intakes and
more space around the sidepods.
So, under the skin the RP20 is
very different from the Mercedes
W10 it imitates. And there’s no guaranteethe team will be able to
understand and maximise the potential of its new aero concept, though it
now has more time to do so than it originally anticipated. Racing Point’s
original plan was to bring updates to the first race and then perhaps one or
two more upgrade packages before committing fully to 2021 development–
its aim was to do a smash-and-grab, maximising its points haul early on.
“We were unsure whetherwe were goingto realise the full potential of
what we’ve seen in the simulation,” says Green. “Everything wesee so far
suggests we have transferred across from the modelside to the full side.
“We couldn’t do aslow start and look to upgrade through the season as
we didlast year. That’s notgoing
to be possible. We knew the rest
of the year was going to be very
challenging [in terms of allocating
resources to the 2021 project].”
Given the attenuated nature of
this season, Racing Point’s strategy
may prove to be a prudent one.
And its new car will now havea
longer shelflife, since the new
technical rules due to come in next
year have been deferred until 2022.
If the RP20 is as competitive as
everybody thinks, expect the knives
to be out for Racing Point again.The battlefor ‘best ofthe rest’ spotbehind thetop threeteams has become
spicyoff the track as wellas onit over the past couple of seasons...RacingPoint lackedthe budget to fo llow
Mercedes’ rake concept sooner