09 – Lotus F1 Racing

Credit: Lotus F1

Stats

• Team Principal: Tony Fernandes
• Factory: Hingham, Italy
• Website: lotusf1racing.my
• Drivers: Jarno Trulli, Heikki Kovalainen
• F1 Debut: Bahrain 2010
• Championships: 0

Full WCC Results

• 2010 -

2010 Preview

From the F1 Digest 2010 Season Preview:

The Lotus team are a new entity in Formula One, despite the fact they are using the name of a previous entrant who last ran in the early 90s. They have Mike Gascoyne on board, who has previously worked for Toyota, Sauber and Renault. He’s not necessarily a well liked figure in the paddock, but he certainly knows what he’s doing. The whole team have made great progress, particularly if you compare it to the other new teams. They are on a par with Virgin Racing, and have already been in stiff competition with them during the pre-season tests. Virgin launched their car first but Lotus had a better event. The new car was revealed with the age-old green and yellow livery, which has divided opinion in the Sidepodcast comments at least. On balance, I think it is mostly a positive outcome though. Good to see the old livery back again.

During testing, they seemed to have less reliability problems than the Virgin Racing team but they have had to work through a few niggles of their own. In terms of the car itself – the T127 – the nose is clean and straight, with no major dimples or dips. The front wing has a lot of detail on it, whilst the sidepods look quite boxy and the back of the car looks much less sculpted than the front.

They’ve signed up Heikki Kovalainen and Jarno Trulli for 2010, and as a partnership, I think they’ll do well developing the car and pushing as hard as they can, but I’m not sure if they are a winning formula. Points will be the best Lotus can hope for, for now.