Renault boss Bob Bell has refused to accept the FIA's decision to allow the new McLaren rear wing design to pass inspection, slamming the Woking team live on the BBC for starting "another arms race" in the sport at the start of 2010.
The McLaren squad's innovative car design for 2010 sees a combination of driver-controlled air flow through the car and slots in the wing help to 'stall' the rear wing at higher speeds, in a design quirk that some have suggested is worth up to 6kph in outright speed.
The Red Bull and Ferrari teams apparently asked the FIA to clarify that the design was legal, and the FIA's scrutineers said yesterday that the car was within the rules and could race in Bahrain this weekend.
But although Red Bull's Christian Horner ruled out a formal protest after the FIA decision, and suggested that his team would now work on a similar design of their own, Bell told the BBC during FP1 at the Sakhir track that a protest was "not out of the question".
The Renault managing director said that he felt the design was against the "spirit of the rules", and warned that the inevitable moves by every other team on the grid to develop their own system would "cost everybody a lot of money", criticising the FIA for not banning the device when they had the chance.
"It is fundamentally clear that the McLaren wing design is totally illegal – and they have driven a cart horse through the sprit of the rules and regulations," he ranted live on the Beeb.
"They have opened up another arms race; it's going to cost everybody a lot of money. The governing body needs to be a lot stronger with these things."
He added that the idea of teams spending big money on developing their own stalling systems made no sense when the sport was currently looking to reduce costs.
"I think that it is ridiculous in this era where we are all trying to save money," he whined, "We are restricted by the number of people that we can bring to the track, with mechanics working ridiculous hours at night to prepare the car.
"Now we have just opened another arms race that will cost us all a lot of money. It's just a nonsense. I think the governing body needs to be more responsible in decisions like this."
He admitted that a formal protest was unlikely, but said that he couldn't rule out the possibility of another team going down that route.
"I honestly couldn't comment on that at this stage," he muttered, "It's obviously not out of the question that any team could protest at this stage."
Meanwhile, in a move that is not at all a pleasing display of hypocrisy, the Renault team are understood to have made a formal request to circumvent the current engine design rules to help boost their ailing V8 unit.
The French powerplant is renowned for being the weakest in the field, power-wise, though it is reportedly one of the strongest on efficiency and fuel mileage, which may help to level their performance in 2010.
They are thought to have requested an engine performance boost from the FIA under the "fair and equitable" grounds that are part of the rules governing engine modifications.
Although he refused to talk directly about the reports of a formal Renault request, Red Bull boss Horner, whose own team use customer Renault engines, said that the engine freeze did need a "solution".
"There is an issue with the engines and it would be a great shame if, under the engine freeze, engine performance is going to dictate the championship," he moaned, "Renault need to find a solution and quickly."
Currently, engine designs have been frozen until the end of 2011, though the FIA have tweaked performance levels in the past to try and keep the grid on a level playing field.
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