Lotus F1 became the third team to unveil their 2015 challenger by releasing images of the new Mercedes-powered E23 Hybrid via social media.
The Enstone-based outfit are hoping that this new car will a be more competitive following a disappointing 2014 championship. A switch to a new engine manufacturer is certainly a positive step.
In addition, Lotus has spend much of last season consolidating its finances and restructuring its technical organisation so as to ensure that it returned to form this year.
The E23 Hybrid looks very beautiful, especially the front nose. This is a major contrast to that ugly and now-outlawed twin-tusk concept in 2014.
Lotus technical director Nick Chester described the car, which will be powered by Mercedes’ V6 hybrid turbo, as “a massive step forward”.
“It’s no secret that we struggled with last year’s car so we’ve targeted every area that caused us an issue,” he said. “We’ve made strong progress in the wind tunnel as well as in areas such as packaging and cooling.”
“We expect the E23 to perform far, far better than its predecessor.”
Chester said the new power unit “looks to be the one area of the car which could bring us the greatest performance gain”.
“It’s not just performance, but reliability and driveability as well as packaging and cooling too,” he explained.
Romain Grosjean and Pastor Maldonado have been retained for another season while the first shakedown of the new car will take place at Jerez, as part of pre-season testing.
Fingers crossed the E23 goes as quicly as it looks at the race tracks this season.
News stories on the Lotus E23 Hybrid:
http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2015/1/16776.html
http://www.formula1.com/news/interviews/2015/1/16775.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/30986521
http://www1.skysports.com/f1/news/12433/9675485/lotus-reveal-first-look-at-e23
http://www1.skysports.com/f1/gallery/12837/9675525/lotus-e23—first-look
http://www1.skysports.com/f1/news/12473/9654638/jolyon-palmer-is-targeting-a-2016-race-seat-after-being-appointed-lotus-test-driver
http://wtf1.co.uk/lotus-unveil-the-lotus-e23-hybrid/
http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/2015/01/26/lotus-reveal-first-images-new-e23/
Social media
https://twitter.com/Lotus_F1Team
https://www.facebook.com/LotusF1Team
Lotus has the budget it needs to achieve its target of challenging Williams in Formula 1 this year, claims its CEO Matthew Carter.
Having spent last year consolidating its finances to cut dramatic losses, the team now has a much better handle over its budget.
After admitting that it had perhaps gone too far with staffing cutbacks last year, Carter says that it has responded.
“Without going in to too many details, in trying to sort out the finances – which we did – we laid off a number of people this time last year,” he told AUTOSPORT.
“We possibly laid off a few too many so, during the course of the year, we got people back to the design office and aero office.
“We’ve also restructured the aero department and we are now seeing the fruits of that effort come off.”
Although Lotus has lost some sponsors to Williams, and its car had some empty space in computer images released on Monday, Carter says that the money situation will be different by the time the 2015 season begins.
“Our budget for this year, although reduced compared to 2013, is similar to last season,” he said.
“We have a couple of new sponsors that, although not featured on the car today, will be there for the first race.
“A lot of the back office work at the business is producing results, so financially we are looking good.
“And it is important to say that if we do get more money, then that will go straight on to improving car performance.
“In previous years such additions may have gone in to the black hole of debt, but now it can go straight on to the car.”
The change from Renault to Mercedes engines has left Lotus hoping it can repeat what Williams did last year, when it jumped up the grid.
Carter believes that the steady financial situation, and staffing tweaks mean that it can achieve its ambition of threatening its Grove-based rival.
“We are hoping that we can challenge and get around where Williams are,” said Carter, who revealed that windtunnel figures for the new E23 had been hugely encouraging.
“I don’t want to be too optimistic, because it is important to be realistic, but finishing third or fourth in the constructors’ championship is really our target.
“But that is largely dependent on how Red Bull cope with Renault, what Honda do with McLaren and where Ferrari get to.”
Source: Autosport.com
Easily the best looking reveal so far, classic colours + classic design, save for the rear spoiler being way too narrow, but that’s more due to FIA regs than anything else (hell, if it was as wide as I’d like it to be the FIA would ban the car on looks alone!!!) 😛
Still, it will be forever remembered in my mind as the first F1 car not to suffer from ‘nose pimple’ in 2015, hopefully it won’t be the last!!!!!
One final note, I thought the car looked too clean, but reading through it seems it’ll have more sponsors in race spec. That’s a shame actually, it looks REALLY nice as is, but they need the money so it’s understandable. I just hope it doesn’t get too cluttered, I’m looking at YOU, livery designers!!! >_>
You’re right about that. The Lotus E23 Hybrid looks so much better when compared to that slow and bitch ugly E22 from last year. I bet both Grosjean and Maldonado are so glad to see the back of the least competitive car last season.
Regarding the nose, this is the part of a series of new regulations as stated by the governing body, the FIA. Details can be seen here: http://www.formula1.com/inside_f1/rules_and_regulations/sporting_regulations/12877/
Looking forward to seeing the other teams and their Formula 1 cars before the first pre-season testing begins on February 1st.