Renault to re-use Magnussen's Spa engine

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Renault has revealed that it intends to use the power plant that was in Kevin Magnussen's car when he suffered a high-speed accident going through Eau Rouge last month.

Magnussen escaped serious injury in the incident, which saw his car badly damaged by impact with the tyre walls at Raidillon after spinning out of control early in the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa-Francorchamps.

But the team has revealed that despite the apparently devastating accident which meant the team was forced to use a new chassis for Magnussen at Monza, the power unit seemed to have escaped damage and would be available for use in practice at Singapore next weekend.

"It’s likely we’ll run Kevin’s Spa power unit on Friday in Singapore or Sepang as it looks like there was no serious damage to it in the accident," said the team's chief technical officer Bob Bell on Friday.

"One of the real success stories of this year has been how strong the power unit has been, not only though being able to exercise enhanced performance but in the reliability we’ve seen. It’s been a tremendous job from everyone in Viry," he added.

Because of the high heat and humidity, Singapore's Marina Bay Street Circuit is a particularly gruelling venue for both cars and drivers.

"It’s a race where drivers really have to be on their mettle. It’s tough for everyone as it’s hot and humid. For the drivers, it’s a long race on a bumpy circuit," explained Bell.

"It’s tough on brakes and requires high downforce but that said, there’s nothing to say that we shouldn’t put on a reasonable show," he continued.

"Most of the corners are low speed so that’s what we target with the set-up. It’s quite bumpy so you need to get a good set-up for ride then it’s fine tuning around that. If you have a solid base set-up the pace will come to you over the sessions as the grip from the surface improves and driver confidence grows.

"Over the course of the weekend one of our biggest challenges is understanding the car with the moving target of track surface evolution.

"This is the same with any street course and you can find yourself chasing your tail somewhat as it’s difficult to ascertain if any lap time improvement is from a change made to the car or just from the track surface improvement.

"For this reason you don’t want to change too much of the car set-up over the practice sessions.

"To have a strong Grand Prix you need to arrive with a good set-up out of the box so the drivers can gain pace through both their confidence and circuit evolution."

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.