#the whole affiliate thing just fuckin baffles me

[callumilott-archive]

the curious case of the renault sport academy: an essay

alternatively titled: the essay i wasn’t going to write about the mess of the rsa but here it is anyway, supported by facts (also titled: the curious case of anthoine & guanyu)

some standard background: rsa started in 2016, they organise training camps occasionally (tho not so much what with covid) that consist of a lot of cycling. so much cycling they all cry about it. they currently have 6 drivers signed to their academy of which one is a notable outlier - guanyu zhou. the other boys signed have all won titles at one point. guanyu has not. in fact, his best championship result was a second place in 2015, he has not placed higher than 6th since. now, renault is known for snatching up title winners, the winner of formula renault would get signed to the academy (like max fewtrell, oscar piastri) and they’ve picked up some other promising guys as well, signing them to the academy straight away.

if we count back to 2019, another curious addition adds itself to the academy. actually should say 2018 because that’s where it gets interesting. anthoine’s results in 2017 weren’t mind blowing, he didn’t score a single win but did manage to get a couple fastest laps to find himself in 4th position at the end of the year. renault invent a new role, designed specifically for anthoine as he was the first driver to carry this role: affiliate driver. it’s not quite being signed to the academy, he doesn’t run a renault livery, merely has renault on the rear wing (and ART ran an altered livery for 2 other renault kids in f3 the following year), but he does get to go on training camps. it’s a sort of halfway signing, and while i have not been able to find any proof for this, i suspect they told him to win the gp3 title for an actual signing (stick, meet carrot) or get dropped. as we know, he did win and he did get the full signing, black and yellow suit included.

the only other affiliate i’ve been able to find was leonardo lorandi in early 2019, around the same time anthoine got ‘promoted’ for lack of a better word. lorandi didn’t do so well however (18th place in the championship that year) and i haven’t heard anything about him so i suspect he’s just kind of disappeared. definitely was not added to the academy. begs the question, if you want to have a junior program filled with talented drivers and you have someone with better results than one you already signed. why the hassle? why sign guanyu with no outstanding results since 2015, but invent a whole new role for anthoine with a better result in 2017 and a title to his name (french f4 2013)? i’m gonna take an educated guess and say the answer is money.

this isnt related to my essay BUT since im talking about this anyway and i’m still pissed about this, have a little look at the very backhanded compliments of one cyril abiteboul on september 2, 2019. https://www.planetf1.com/f1-races/belgian-grand-prix/abiteboul-f1-was-right-to-race/ make of this what u will :)

moving on, there’s also the matter of renault dropping drivers like hot potatoes at a fairly similar rate to red bull, if i’m honest. guys in the academy in 2018 were long gone by the time 2019 rolled around. ye yifei was a newly signed member of the rsa in 2019, a new signing for placing third in formula renault the previous year. he had a dreadful season in f3 and was consequently dropped. he then finished second in f3 asia (late 2019/early 2020) and went on to win euroformula open in 2020. not a bad driver, right. victor martins, too. his name might sound familiar if you’ve watched formula renault in 2020, because he became champion. the year before that, runner up in formula renault (to oscar piastri). renault dropped him anyway, presumably because he did not win the title. very interested to see if they’re gonna have to sign him again because he won. anyway, i digress.

rumour’s been going around that max fewtrell and hadrien david will both be dropped from the academy for not acquiring results expected of them. in this i would just like to point out that hadrien is literally 16 and this was his second season of single seaters, and he was a total rookie in formula renault. most recent formula renault champions (max fewtrell, oscar piastri, victor martins) required 2 years to get up to speed in that category. hadrien placed tenth in a field of 22, so not entirely dreadful. max fewtrell’s season was just a disaster all around and given that he has 2 titles to his name (2016 and 2018), i wouldn’t go ahead and call him a bad driver. now i have no clue what happened or why he and hitech decided to part ways before spa but it’s pretty obvious he wasn’t feeling good in that team.

THEN there’s also the matter of the rsa director saying everyone did a fuckin terrible job except oscar. https://formulaspy.com/f1/renault-we-expected-more-from-our-junior-drivers-73087 ‘not mad just disappointed’ vibes.

in short, the rsa just feels like a giant mess and like they’re desperately trying to gather whichever driver is hot topic at the moment and then dropping them without hesitation when they don’t perform up to standard. do they even get support aside from the cycling bootcamps? and WHAT are they even gathering them for, considering there’s the ongoing issue of no renault seats ever going to a member of their academy. my professional conclusion is this: FUCK renault. thank u for ur attention