Motor Racing: Renault F1 team buoyed after difficult week
Posted: 28 September 2009 2319 hrs

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SINGAPORE: Renault go to Japan this week keen to draw a line under the race-fix scandal that has dogged them at Singapore, with team principal Bob Bell admitting it has been a difficult few days.

The mood in the camp has brightened after Fernando Alonso won the French manufacturer its first podium finish of the season on Sunday when he came third behind McLaren winner Lewis Hamilton and Toyota's Timo Glock.

Bell, who has replaced the disgraced Flavio Briatore after the Italian's part in team orders for Nelson Piquet to deliberately crash here last year, said the result was a great outcome in the circumstances.

"It was absolutely fantastic," he said.

"It's wonderful to get a podium at any time but to get one after what the team has just been through is really positive and gives us great strength to move on now.

"Everybody in the team will now go to the final three races very buoyed by this result because it shows that the team can fight for the podium."

Renault was thrown into disarray when Briatore was last week banned from the sport indefinitely and chief engineer Pat Symonds was suspended for five years.

With main sponsor ING pulling the plug ahead of the Singapore race, forcing Renault to remove the Dutch bank's logos from their cars, the controversy has dogged the team here.

Renault managing director Jean-Francois Caubet said a podium finish was vitally important from a commercial point of view.

"To end the weekend with a podium is a great result. When we arrived here on Wednesday we did not think it was achievable, but little by little we have made it possible," he said.

"It's great to get a podium here and it's extremely important for Renault, for our partner TOTAL and for our sponsors, and for Renault F1 Team. We showed that Renault F1 has what it takes to fight at the front."

The podium finish had a lot to do with Alonso's considerable driving skills, but the team is almost certain to be without their lead man next year with the Spaniard expected to leave for Ferrari.

Reports said BMW Sauber's Robert Kubica, from Poland, would likely be his replacement, joining young, but promising, Frenchman Romain Grosjean. - AFP/de