Renault’s season going ‘better than the plan’

Putting space between themselves and McLaren in the standings, Cyril Abiteboul says Renault’s season is going “better than the plan.”

Although McLaren led the early running in the battle for this season’s best of the rest title, it is Renault who have pulled ahead of late.

Back-to-back double points-hauls in Monaco and Canada have put the Enstone team 16 points clear while their 56 points-tally is just one shy of last year’s overall score.

“That had to be the target, so the job is done, leaving Canada with 10 points – 10 points against most of our direct competitors, starting with McLaren,” Renault Sport F1 boss Abiteboul told Autosport.

“That’s good. It must be three times the points in terms of points scoring compared to this time last year.

“That’s almost better than the plan.”

He added: “It was a solid drive from our two guys, no mistakes. The first lap was not so easy, but it was a very good strategy to recover from Esteban after losing a position to him at the start.

“And it was also a solid race in managing the fact that we had to do a very long second stint on the supersoft, and that Esteban would at some point be a threat and pushing.

“So we also had to manage the racing spirit of our two drivers, and make sure that Nico would not hold back Carlos in his defence from any move from Esteban.

“It’s a very, very strong team result.”