Saturday, February 13, 2010

Lotus Officially Unveils Their Formula 1 Car

February 12th of 2010 marks a significant milestone for British automaker Lotus when they unveiled their Formula 1 car for the motorsport series's 2010 season, marking their return to F1 after a 16-year hiatus. The Lotus Cosworth T127, powered by Cosworth's CA2010 V8 engine will be piloted by Italian Jarno Trulli and Finnish Heikki Kovalainen with reserve and test driver Fairuz Fauzy Malaysia. The team, backed by Malaysian entrepeneur and team principal Datuk Tony Fernandes as well as the Malaysian government and Proton Holdings Berhad, the current owner of the Lotus company will challenge for top honours with established teams such as Ferrari, Mercedes, McLaren and Renault.

Datuk Tony Fernandes said during the launch, “I am extremely proud to be here today and to be able to show the world the fruits of the team’s hard work over the last five months. It’s humbling for me and my fellow shareholders, Kamarudin Meranun and SM Nasarudin to see how a team that five months ago didn’t even exist is now a thriving workforce, full of enthusiasm and passion for Lotus Racing and the challenges ahead and capable of producing such a beautiful machine in such a short time. Now we’ve achieved two major milestones; confirming our entry and unveiling our car, but now the real work starts. Next we move on to testing and the season ahead and I’m confident that the team will exceed expectations wherever we go, and will do so on a wave of support around the world that has been growing daily since we first unleashed Lotus Racing back in September 2009.”

“The last few months have been some of the most challenging of my career, but it’s been a challenge the whole team and I have thrived on since we first started work on the car up in Norfolk. I’m delighted that we’ve reached this point, and now we have a beautiful car that gives us a great base to work from for the season ahead and a fighting chance of going racing in the right way, with a winning mentality. The hard part starts now, and I know everyone in the team and I are up for whatever lies ahead,” said the team’s technical chief Mike Gascoyne.

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