Category: Lotus

Lotus in Formula One

The return of Lotus to Formula One in 2010 is a bitter sweet scenario for many. The much revered icon of British motorsport is now heavily backed by outside influences with Malaysian ownership under the watch of Proton since 1994. Will the return of Lotus to the F1 grid honour the memory of the late, great Colin Chapman? Or will its return be a once great star that fails to glimmer as brightly as in times past?

At this stage, at least, the current holders of the Lotus name seem to be making the right noises in regards to understanding the burden they carry with their return to the Formula One paddock.

Having just been given the keys to the Lotus F1 Racing media portal it was a nice surprise to discover these old skool images. A timely find, too, as today marks the 27th year since Colin Chapman passed away.

Also of note is an article which briefly documents the history of Lotus in F1. That piece, along with more images to accompany that stunning image of Graham Hill in a Lotus 49B from the 1969 German Grand Prix can be seen after the jump.

For more historic Lotus racing material, check out the Classic Team Lotus website.

Formula 1 Lotus

Lotus F1 signs Jarno Trulli and Heikki Kovalainen

Post author By Liam
Post date 14 December, 2009

Lotus F1 announced today that Italy’s Jarno Trulli and Finland’s Heikki Kovalainen will form their main driving team in 2010. Malaysia’s Fairuz Fauzy will fill the test driver’s role.

Team Principal, Tony Fernandes, said in a statement released by Lotus F1, “The appointment of Jarno, Heikki and Fairuz as our race drivers is a testament to the quality of our team, to our ambition and drive, and above all to our long-term vision of success in Formula 1.”

Trulli and Kovalainen are well known to Formula One, of course, both having won races in the past. Fauzy, meanwhile, last experienced F1 in a test driver capacity for the Spyker team in 2007.

Both Jarno and Heikki said all the right things on their first day on the job, “It is a privilege for me to sign for the new Lotus F1 Racing team. I have been impressed by the long-term vision of the team management and technical staff. Tony has set out very ambitious plans and I am ready to help the team achieve these high targets,” said Trulli.

Meanwhile, Kovalainen showed he knows on which side his bread is buttered, “I’m also excited to be part of a team that is not only bringing back the Lotus name, one of the most iconic teams in any form of global motorsport, but also doing so with the support and backing of Malaysia, a country I fell in love with when I first raced there in 2007.”

So, is the the coup that Lotus F1 would have us believe? Or in the cut and thrust world of F1, is this a middle of the road signing for what is likely to be a middle of the road team (in its first year or two, at least). Maybe it’s a wise move to sign two guys with experience, and both have shown, with the right cars, they have the pace. The question is, will they have the right car?

The full release can be read at the Lotus F1 Racing website. The Q&A statement, featuring Tony Fernandes, Jarno Trulli and Heikki Kovalainen is also worth a read.

Lotus

Google Street View takes on Lotus test track

Post author By Liam
Post date 2 December, 2009

Lotus test track

The chaps at Lotus have invited one of the Google Street View fleet to do a few laps around their test track at Hethel near Norwich. This is the first race track in the UK to be captured by Street View cameras and Lotus fans can see cars such as the 2-Eleven, an Evora prototype and an ethanol powered Exige 265E lapping the circuit.

You can check it out for yourself by clicking here.

Lotus

Lotus Evora Type 124 Endurance Racer

Post author By Liam
Post date 12 September, 2009

Lotus have turned their “luxury” tourer, the Evora, into an out and out racer. The Type 124 (one twenty four) meets full FIA racing specifications and has been designed for endurance racing. There is a reasonably extensive factory backed calendar of races in line for the 124, starting with next year’s NÃ¼rburgring 24 hour race (15-16 May 2010). Sepang, Silverstone and Dubai are also on the endurance race calendar for the Evora.

Luke Bennett, Director of Lotus Cars Limited, said, â€œMotorsport has been in our blood ever since our founder, Colin Chapman, built the first Lotus back in 1948. We are proud of our motorsport history, which includes victories in Formula One, Le Mans, saloon car, rally car and sportscar racing around the world; more recently, we won the British GT3 Championship in 2006 with the Lotus Exige. The Lotus Evora Type 124 Endurance Racecar is from the same unique stable and we expect it to be a competitive racecar when we enter various endurance races next year.â€

Power from the Toyota sourced 3.5 litre V6 will be upped by as much as 100kW, from 206kW to 300kW (400bhp). While the target racing weight is somewhere below 1200kg, down from the road car’s 1350kg. Should be quite a rocket ship, then.

There’s a six-speed sequential transmission (with paddle shifts), six piston AP Racing brakes and race tuned Bosch ABS. Helping grip the racetrack will be 18 inch wheels with Pirelli racing rubber, 9 1/2″ wide on the front and 11″ wide at the rear.

More detail and pics after the jump.

Lotus

Lotus Evora – Australian specs and pricing

Post author By Liam
Post date 8 June, 2009
3 Comments on Lotus Evora – Australian specs and pricing

The Lotus Evora is now available for Australian order. To help its customers go through the decision making process Lotus Australia have released pricing and specification details.

The first bit of news is quite good. List pricing, before statutory and delivery charges, for the entry level Evora 2+0 will start at $149,990. This figure is $13,000 less than the price announced at the Melbourne International Motor Show earlier this year. The up-spec 2+2 will begin at $156,990.

The Evora is equipped with a 3.5-litre V6 which produces 206kW of power and 342Nm of torque. Matched to a 6-speed manual box this is good enough to propel the coupÃ© from rest to 100km/h in a smidge over five seconds.

For the record, the Evora’s official fuel consumption figure is under 9 litres, at 8.7l/100km, and 205g of CO2 are emitted every kilometre. Not that too many Lotus buyers would bother much with those figures.

The car will be on Australian roads some time after July and special ‘Launch Edition’ models will be available in Ardent Red or British Racing Green. Presumably these are the colours they can’t sell in Europe as all other from the Lotus palette are available for order at an extra cost.

Further to the special ‘Launch Edition’ colours are three option packs. These packs will be available as a cost option after the initial run of higher specification vehicles is completed. (That probably brings us back to the original pricing announced at MIMS in February.)

The three packs are Tech, Sport and Premium and add items such as a touch-screen display, iPod connection, cruise control, parking sensors, accent lighting, full leather trimming in selected colour, traction control, sports diffuser and switchable sports mode.

A full press release from Lotus and comprehensive specs are all yours after the jump.

Lotus Targa Tasmania

Lotus Exige Cup 260 takes on Targa

Post author By Liam
Post date 6 April, 2009
5 Comments on Lotus Exige Cup 260 takes on Targa

Dean Evans will be gladly flogging the bejeezus out of a Lotus Exige Cup 260 in the Targa Tasmania event later this month.

With 192kW at their disposal, and just 890kg of car to move around it’s pretty safe to say Evans and co-driver Simone Bachmann have the ingredients to be at the pointy end of the field. Indeed the Cup 260 is good for a 100km/h sprint time of just 4.1 seconds.

Helping the Colin Chapman mantra of â€œhorsepower makes you fast in a straight line, lightness makes you fast everywhereâ€ to live on, this will be the world wide tarmac rally debut of the Exige Cup 260.

More specs and detail after the jump in the Lotus presser, and a rather tasty YouTube clip that shows what Dean Evans can do in a Lotus (if you haven’t seen this clip, I suggest you take the time to watch it).

Honda Hyundai Kia Lotus Motor Shows Suzuki Toyota

MIMS 2009 – Best of the rest

Post author By Liam
Post date 4 March, 2009

Here is one last wrap up of images from the media day at the 2009 Melbourne International Motor Show.

There’s pics from Honda (Insight, Civic Type R), Hyundai (i10 Blue, i30 Blue, Genesis CoupÃ©), Kia (Soul), Lotus (Europa SE), Suzuki (Alto), Toyota (fully sik RAV4, fully sik Yaris, Hybrid Camry) and a few other bits and pieces, including the AutoHorizon FR-1, a charity-based project helping young kids.

So, what was the media day like? I have to say I was a bit nervous attending with a room full of battle-hardened journos around me. However, it was not really an issue and it was pretty cool moving around from stand to stand with nobody looking at me funny when I went up to various cars and opened them up, taking photos or just generally pushing and prodding around. Certainly a bit different, and better, than attending the show as a member of the general public.

Personally, I didn’t make the most of the networking opportunities on offer. Something I’m usually not good at, so I guess I’ll need to work on that.

Overall, though, it was a fun and valuable learning experience. It’s interesting seeing how many different ways there are to pull a cover off a car. Or not! My flight time meant I missed the presentations from Ford, Holden and Toyota, so maybe I missed a few new and innovative sheet pulling techniques!

Full marks to the catering, too, the Asian style lunch provided was very tasty, and after a few hours following Glenn Ridge around from presentation to presentation I was pretty damn hungry.

It was a long day, getting up at 4:30am to catch a plane from Canberra to Melbourne and not getting back to the hotel until 5pm. Before turning around and going back to the show as a casual observer with my wife.

I hope the coverage on AUSmotive has been interesting for all the readers out there and the audio clips provided on a few of the posts have brought you a bit closer to the action.

See you in Sydney in October 2010!

Lotus Motor Shows

MIMS 2009 – Lotus Evora

Jonathan Stretton, Lotus General Manager Sales and Marketing was “excited and delighted” to reveal the “most significant” all new model from Lotus in over 10 years. He was speaking about the Lotus Evora, of course. Australian pricing for the 3.5 litre V6 powered Evora will start at $162,990 for the two-seater, and $169,990 for the 2+2.

In addition to the photos and press release from Lotus is an audio recording below of Stretton’s address to the media gallery at the Melbourne International Motor Show.

[audio:http://www.ausmotive.com/audio/MIMS09-Lotus.mp3]