FIA stewards and team officials are currently meeting before a ruling is expected on Renault’s protests regarding the legality of Racing Point’s 2020 car.
The French manufacturer has lodged complaints at each of the past three races referring specifically to the brake ducts of the RP20 as they argue their design breaches regulations on listed parts that each team must themselves develop.
Racing Point is confident the case will be dismissed, claiming the governing body has previously given their car the green light, however, late developments are at least raising a little tension.
During the British Grand Prix weekend, the Silverstone-based team confirmed they had indeed bought in the brake ducts from technical partner Mercedes but that was last year when they were not included as a listed part.
It has also been suggested that Renault’s tip-off came from a previous employee at Racing Point, who has since joined the Enstone-based team.
Even so, the expectation is the stewards will rule in Racing Point’s favour and then it is up to Renault to decide if they wish to appeal.
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The ruling is being closely followed by other teams too, with Ferrari now thought to be involved after also requesting clarification on the legality of the RP20 with McLaren’s support.
“The majority of teams don’t like what Racing Point is doing,” CEO Zak Brown was quoted by The Race. “Whether it’s legal or not is up to the FIA to decide, but it’s outside the spirit of what F1 is.
“There’s always been a degree of copying but they have effectively admitted they replicated someone else’s car.
“The majority of us agree that’s not what F1 should be so we need to write regulations reflecting that.”
Since the controversial design was first seen back in pre-season testing, most have dubbed the Racing Point a ‘Pink Mercedes’ because of its similarity to last year’s W10.
However, the jibe is starting to wear thin among those who helped create the car, as they feel it undercuts the work they have done.
“Not for me so much,” team boss Otmar Szafnauer told Reuters, “but for the guys in the factory, who worked really hard to develop this car to where it is and are still working hard to make further developments.
“For their work to be discounted, to say ‘Ah, you’ve copied’, or ‘plagiarised’ as I heard somebody say, it’s absolutely not true and it has gone too far,” he added.
Only last week though, Sky Sports’ Martin Brundle praised Racing Point for their attempt to replicating the 2019 Silver Arrow.
“To replicate a car that works, it is stretching my imagination on that,” the former driver told Motorsport.com.
“Having said that, they do buy – in a legitimate way – the engine and gearbox, which fixes your rear suspension, pick up points, and suspension elements. They buy everything they can.
“There’s an awful lot of reference points on the car that they legitimately buy and it’s just there are bits underneath aero parts and all that.
“When they created this, they had to finesse it, so they’ve done an extraordinary job.”