Now Renault consider their Formula 1 future

Formula 1 is in turmoil today after the Japanese team Toyota quit the sport and fellow constructor Renault held an emergency board meeting in Paris to consider their own future. The French carmaker is considering whether to close its team, just make engines (they currently supply the Red Bull team) or leave Formula 1 altogether. Acting Renault F1 team principal, Bob Bell and its managing director Jean-Francois Caubet both attended the summit.

It has been an especially trying year for Renault: their car underperformed in the 2009 season, with the team coming eighth out of ten in the constructors' championship, and they also lost team principal Flavio Briatore and chief engineer Pat Symonds in the wake of the Crashgate affair. Two-time world champion driver Fernando Alonso is also leaving the team to join Ferrari.

Should Renault leave the sport entirely, it would be the end of a long and successful history. The team have twice won the drivers' and constructors' championship (in 2005 and 2006 with Alonso), and won 35 races out of 265 contested. They have also boasted drivers such as Alain Prost, Jenson Button and Giancarlo Fisichella. Writing on the BBC's website, blogger Andrew Benson said that unlike Toyota, "Renault has motorsport in their corporate blood - in that they absolutely understand what is required to succeed."

Reaction to Toyota's decision earlier yesterday continues to emerge. Formula 1's governing body the FIA said: "Toyota's decision, however, comes just weeks after its F1 team signed the new Concorde Agreement until 2012. Urgent clarification is now being sought from the Toyota F1 team as to its legal position in relation to the championship. This will have a direct bearing on the admission of any future 13th entry."

Bernie Ecclestone, the sport's ringmaster, was slightly less bullish than on Tuesday night when he had told the Daily Telegraph that "I very much doubt [Toyota] would not go through with something they have already signed." The Guardian reports him as saying late yesterday that "I'm not sure what we will do. They did sign the agreement knowing exactly what it meant. Fortunately we have other teams coming."