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Red Bull's hopes of challenging Mercedes at the German Grand Prix could be boosted if a major Renault software upgrade works in final practice.

The French car manufacturer has been developing over the past few weeks a software tweak to boost the power output of its Formula 1 engine.

And although it did not complete the sign-off of the changes during last week's Silverstone test, when there were problems getting it incorporated with other software systems on the cars, the latest development tried out on Friday was encouraging.

Renault's head of track operations Remi Taffin hoped that further tweaking of its settings in final practice in Germany would be enough to deliver its full potential, which could be worth a few tenths of a seconds for its teams.

"We tested it in Silverstone - but we could not run it as we wished," said Taffin. "We ran it again today and it's looking promising, but it still needs quite a bit of tuning.

"Tomorrow P3 is obviously quite a quick session, but we are working to get the right setting, and if we get it right it should be a step forward.

"We are not talking about hundredths, we are talking about tenths."

The software changes are focused on improving the efficiency of Renault's internal combustion engine (ICE), which will have a knock-on effect of providing more power.

"It's about making the ICE more efficient," he said. "The amount of fuel is limited, so if you make the engine more efficient you get more power. But it's not always easy to make it happen."

