Renault still plan aggressive development

The team have scored just nine points in seven races so far - 16 less than at this point last season - and lie in seventh place in the constructors' championship.

Renault's star driver Fernando Alonso said last week that the team should consider switching their focus to 2009 if planned upgrades for the next two races are not a clear step forward.

Bell, however, says Renault have an aggressive development plan for the rest of the year.

He also admitted the team had been encouraged by their form in Montreal, where Alonso fought near the top despite the team expecting a tough weekend.

"I think that is one of the real strengths that we draw from Canada," said Bell. "The car seems so be performing well on most circuits and that just reiterates that we've got a very strong platform now to go forward for the rest of the season.

"We're under no illusion that we're going to have to work very hard to keep that level of competitiveness up, but we have an aggressive development programme for the rest of the season, and we are confident that we have an adaptable baseline to work from."

He added: "I think there is obviously a degree of frustration that we haven't been able to covert our competitiveness into points.

"But in the meantime, we take heart from the fact that the car seems competitive, we have a great driver in Fernando, and we just need to keep our focus and continue putting the developments on the car.

"The worst thing we can do is get spooked by it and start losing our attention to detail and commitment. We'll keep our heads down and things will come right for us."

Bell said the team will introduce several new updates at their home race this weekend.

"We have quite a few developments that we evaluated at Barcelona last week for use in Magny-Cours," he added.

"We've got some aerodynamic developments on the front wing, some aerodynamic parts at the rear of the car, and some developments to the suspension. It's a good package of upgrades, which will hopefully help us take another step forward."