Nelsinho Piquet must up his game and 'start having more good bits than bad bits', Renault have warned – or else the Brazilian will find his time in Formula 1 is fast running out.

The 22-year-old has struggled so far this season – his maiden campaign in the top flight – failing to trouble the points-scorers in the opening five grands prix and rarely getting close to team-mate Fernando Alonso in terms of lap times, trailing the double world champion five-nil in the qualifying stakes.

Piquet has an average starting position of 15th – in stark contrast to Alonso's eighth – and twice has dropped out in the opening phase of the qualifying session. What's more, a litany of spins and errors have spoiled his race performances – with just two finishes to his name, and the best of those eleventh place in Malaysia, three spots and 22 seconds behind Alonso – and now Renault are beginning to ramp up the pressure.

“He needs to start having more good bits than bad bits,” the Régie's sporting manager Steve Nielsen told F1SA, “and he needs to start doing that as soon as he can.

“Formula 1 is a business – it's a very cut-throat business – and if people don't deliver, they go the obvious way.”

Despite the threat of the axe hanging over his head should he not up his game – and soon – Piquet remained upbeat about his prospects, comparing his trials and tribulations to those of predecessor Heikki Kovalainen, who was publicly slated by Renault's outspoken managing director Flavio Briatore following a disappointing debut in Australia last year. The Finn took several races to get fully into his stride before dramatically turning his season around in the second half and going on to secure a McLaren-Mercedes seat in 2008.

“Some drivers take a bit more time to learn,” the son of former three-time world champion Nelson Piquet explained to international news agency Reuters, “[and] some get it straight at the beginning. I think it depends on the situation and how comfortable the driver is with the car and the team.

“Heikki had a difficult beginning of the season [in 2007], but he ended up good. I spent one year without racing and the year that I didn't race, testing was cut to a half. The year that Heikki didn't race, he drove absolutely thousands of kilometres in the car so he knew the car from head-to-toe.

“Heikki is doing very well now, so maybe for a driver not to be doing well in the beginning can be something normal and then a driver always improves.”

Unflattering comparisons have also perhaps unfairly been drawn between Piquet and former GP2 Series title rival Lewis Hamilton, who notched up a staggering nine successive rostrum finishes and only narrowly missed out on the drivers' world crown during his own rookie year in the uppermost echelon in 2007.