A trail-blazing yellow tea-pot

On the day Renault launches its 2017 fighter, we travel back almost forty years ago to the very first time a yellow car from the Regie graced an F1 grid. The British Grand Prix at Silverstone, in July 1977, saw Renault roll out its RS01, the first F1 car powered by a turbocharged engine.

Driven by Jean-Pierre Jabouille, the RS01 was a chunky and unreliable piece of work which blew up in a cloud of smoke on a regular basis, hence the 'tea-pot' moniker. Eventually though, Renault would make its technology work, and even win two years later, blazing the trail for the turbocharged engine in F1.