Renault delay Formula 1 team decision until 2010

The French carmaker Renault has put off a decision about whether it will pull out of Formula 1 motor-racing until the end of the year. Following an emergency board meeting on Wednesday, which appeared to have been called in response to Toyota's decision to leave the motorsport, the head of the company announced the delay.

"You will have to be patient," Renault's chief executive Carlos Ghosn said last night. "We will make an announcement on our participation before the end of the year." The automaker has a number of options; it could continue as is, running a team as it agreed to do at least until 2012 when it signed the Concorde agreement; it could close its team but continue to supply engines to Red Bull; or it could withdraw entirely from Formula 1.

It would seem unlikely that the company could consider the Doomsday scenario; Renault has a proud history in Formula 1, having won the drivers' and constructors' championships in 2005 & 2006, and last year although the Renault team had an awful time, their engines helped Red Bull to six GP wins and second place in the team championship.

But the long-running implications of the Crashgate scandal, which saw the team lose its principal Flavio Briatore and its chief engineer Pat Symonds, has taken its toll on Renault, which itself was given a suspended indefinite ban from the motorsport.

A further option could see the team compete in 2010, but look for a way out at the end of next season. Remarks by Jean-François Caubet, Renault's Formula One managing director, have given rise to this theory; Caubet said on Wednesday that: "We have contracted our drivers, had our budget approved and are enrolled in the world championship. The 2010 season has begun already."

Meanwhile hopes that a Brawn GP style buy-out of Toyota's Cologne-based Formula 1 team have been dashed by John Howett, the team's president. Howett told the Times that "I think it has already been discussed and rejected. Maybe these ideas can be reopened but, at the moment, it would appear not."

Last season Ross Brawn led a management buy-out of Honda when they pulled out of the sport and achieved the seemingly impossible by winning both drivers' and constructors' crowns with the Brawn GP team. ·