► RenaultSport could make a return
► Renault ‘has some ideas’ about new sports cars
► Follows on from appetite for Turbo 3E
Renault’s high-performance arm RenaultSport could make a return after being put to rest in 2023.
Executives in the brand have confirmed during the 2025 Munich motor show that they are in the middle of deciding on proposals to introduce sporty Renault models that may either sit below or beside Alpine.
Fabrice Cambolive, Renault brand CEO, told CAR and other automotive media during the official reveal of the new sixth-generation Clio that the brand is ‘exploring some ideas’ surrounding sporty models that are specifically for the Renault brand.
The last proper RenaultSport model was the Megane R.S. Ultime (pictured below) that launched in 2023, a super limited-run final version of the fiery, rear-steer hot hatch.
More recently, Renault has already been playing around with high-performance cars, crafting the 5 Turbo 3E project that went from wild one-off gymkhana drift car concept to a limited-run, £140k electric supercar. The brand also seems to have sportiness on the brain more generally, given Cambolive has confirmed that the Megane E-Tech is set to receive a ‘hot hatch’-like facelift very soon.
‘But, up to now, we have to find the right balance,’ adds Cambolive. ‘R5 Turbo 3E is an extreme case – the Group will come with some proposals, but in the next 12 months. We have some ideas.’
There was a time, mainly under the stewardship of Luca de Meo, that the Renault Group wanted Alpine to be the sole performance brand within its line-up. ‘But we don’t have that [business] model now where we have to make that choice,’ says Cambolive. ‘We will see when we have to make a big decision on that, but we don’t have a concrete example now.’