Why Did Lotus Fail to Become the British Ferrari?

lotus

in formula one or the

lotus

team as they were known in their heyday by some people, that name may not mean anything, but before mercedes dominated the

ferrari

of the 2010s in the 2000s, the williams in the 90 and the McLaren in the 80s, the team that dominated both the 70s and the 60s was the Lotus Formula 1 team, as they won three drivers' titles and three constructors' titles in the 60s and then three drivers and four builders in the '70s, not only were successful on the track, but also built a strong brand image on the road and even in popular culture, but what happened?

How did the Lotus brand, but more so the Lotus Formula One team, go from being one of the most innovative teams of all time with some of the best drivers of all time and potentially becoming the next powerhouse by becoming the From great britain? Ferrari's answer to a team and brand that is quickly forgotten when you look at where Lotus started in the early 1950s. The one man who will always be intertwined in the company's history is Colin Chapman. Chapman at heart was an engineer and a brilliant engineer at Chapman, who had a passion for designing racing cars, along with some other engineers he graduated with, he started Lotus initially as just the Lotus engineering team, which was the name of the racing side of Lotus, then became separated from the Lotus engineering company and is that team. which entered formula one in 1958 and would soon

become

the largest team in formula one, overall the original lotus team which competed between 1968 and 1994 and became one of the most iconic and influential teams, competed In 491 races, he had 74 grand prix victories, 102 earned 106 podiums and won six drivers' titles and seven constructors' titles.

Lotus was also the first team in F1 history to reach 50 grand prix victories, with Ferrari being second at the time, but what made this achievement simply incredible is that, unlike Ferrari, which had won its first grand prix in 1952 lotus didn't even enter formula one let alone win its first race until seven years later, what is also very unique is that colin chapman himself, who was the team manager, was also the lead designer of the team, as far as I know, he remains the only person to have played both roles in Formula One at the same time and this was just one of the many things that made Lotus such a revolutionary team, in addition to the number of legendary drivers who were successful at Lotus or at least got their names on the team are also amazing jim clark graham hill emerson fitter friend airton cena nigel mansell and even mika hackenan among many others, however many teams have had their careers in formula one and many teams have won championships, but what did Lotus do in What stands out most, as it is not just another F1 team, is how they changed Formula One and how they were the height of technical innovation that has relevance even today in terms of the technical aspect.

This in itself could be its own video because the list of innovations that Chapman invented himself or evolved on pre-existing concepts and then implemented in Formula One was enormous, from being one of the first to successfully integrate rear engines into a racing car Formula One until introducing monocoque chassis to the sport, which made the cars smaller and lighter. It was with this same innovation that was used in the Lotus 25 that in the hands of Jim Clark won the first Lotus world championship in 1963. However, Colin Chapman had his critics because many people argued at that time and even since Chapman ignored the safety simply making their cars as light and fast as possible and there is certainly evidence to support that in an era where driver deaths were more than common, it was even said that after the death of jim clark in 1968, what really emotionally affected colin chapman after he wouldn't go near drivers if they died.

Another thing that Chapman and Lotus did that they were never afraid to do as engineers is experiment with different cars and innovations. In the late 1960s, the team experimented with a gas turbine concept. which was actually derived from an indy car it had four wheel drive without a gearbox and when tested by a young emerson fittopaldi it was described as the most dangerous car he had ever driven because when you braked you also had to step on the accelerator for the car you wouldn't crash finally made its debut in formula one and, although it only competed in four races, it was a perfect example of how colin chapman always pushed the limits of what could be possible and was never afraid to

fail

in another innovation that almost Lo What can be taken for granted is the introduction of aerodynamics.

Lotus was the first to install, as it was known at the time, aerofoil wings on a Formula 1 car, which it did for the first time at the 1968 Monaco Grand Prix, but the pace of development at Lotus was so rapid that, unlike today, where we have to wait a whole season to really see big aerodynamic changes that we can distinguish with our own eyes, Lotus brought innovative new parts to almost every race. These four images, for example, of the Lotus 49 from 1968. Surprisingly, they are all from the same season, they really highlight the introduction of aerodynamics in Formula One and how Lotus learned and developed quickly from race to race, and even in In the last two images you can see that Formula One actually banned very high rear wings because they broke at high speeds and then Lotus lowered the rear wings and put them behind the engine and in a really strange way they are already starting to look like a very early version of the rear wings we have today. 1968 would prove to be one of the most significant years in Formula One history.

This is a picture of the 1967 grid and it is about what you would expect: clean, cigar-shaped cars, basically no real sponsors, apart from some that another very small sticker there, there and now. Take a look at this image from exactly one year later in 1968, suddenly cars now had huge wings at the rear and even at the front you can start to see very early versions of front fins, but again not surprising that the most developed car in the picture, the car with the largest front wing and the only car that now had a full livery as a sponsor was the lotus driven by graham hill now again lotus and colin chapman were at the heart of so many innovations of formula one at the time that fueled the spore that it is almost crazy to think how many years it would have taken F1 to reach where it is now if it had not been for Lotus and the genius of Colin Chapman, including the famous Lotus 78 and Lotus 79.

Ground effect cars that changed the landscape of Formula 1 car design, that same technology and that same concept is what Formula 1 is pinning its hopes on right now for the next era of Formula One in 2022 with the new generation of ground effect cars, but it was not only the technical aspect that Lotus and Chapman innovated, but also the business and commercial aspect because, although technically the sponsor logos and stickers had been on racing cars for a long time Before Lotus appeared, Lotus is known as the first team to introduce a title sponsorship and a title-sponsored livery when, during the second race of the 1968 season, they revealed their new livery as part of a sponsorship deal with the gold leaf tobacco.

The deal at the time was estimated at £85,000, which in today's money would be £1.4 million for the first title sponsor in Formula One history was yet another example of how Lotus and Chapman not only raised the team level but rather changed the fundamentals in terms of the business side of what a team could do. From then on, title sponsors became not only a staple of Formula One, but if you

fail

ed to secure funding and sponsorship for your team you wouldn't be on the grid for long, of course Lotus went on to not only have classic gold. leaf livery, but then went on to also have possibly the most iconic livery of all time with the famous black and gold John Player special livery which they displayed for 14 years from 1972 to 1986.

The images, artwork and even the modern depictions that creators love. doing with those cars has such a nostalgic feeling that shows the timelessness of those liveries and in my opinion, that livery even to this day can only be challenged in terms of beauty and longevity by the equally famous mclaren marlboro livery at the end of the century. The 1970s Lotus and Ferrari owned Formula One, both winning four constructors' titles during the decade and, like the Ferrari brand off the track, Lotus used its great success in motorsport over the previous two decades to cultivate a brand image that almost began to rival Ferrari themselves.

Lotus began to use its knowledge and pedigree in motor sport to bring out some of the most exciting cars of the time and the Lotus brand itself began to have a great impact even on popular culture, such as having the Lotus Esprit as the go-to car. James Bond in 1977. film the spy who loved me you can swim success in formula one that could only be rivaled by

ferrari

and colin chapman and lotus reaching heights of popularity that very few brands could for me this famous photo of him leaning on the lotus esprit bonnet The supercar in front of a special John Player liveried aircraft in black and gold simply encapsulated an image of wealth, success but also aspiration, as the brand reached its absolute peak in the late 70s;

However, this is also where things sadly started to fall apart after all their success. In the 60s and 70s In 1982, Colin Chapman died of a heart attack at the age of just 52. The end of his life was also filled with inevitable controversies having been involved in the Delorean scandal and the embezzlement of investors' money despite his flaws and his influence on the Lotus brand and the Lotus Formula One team. cannot be equaled and it is no coincidence that with the death of Chapman in the early 80's the team began a slow downward spiral which eventually led to them having to leave F1 Ferrari.

I would also go through something similar when Enzo Ferrari himself passed away in 1988 but the Ferrari brand and the Ferrari Formula One team had already been controlled and had success a decade earlier under the direction of Luca de Montesemelo who changed the Ferrari brand and took it to the future when chapman passed away there was no one like that who was able to take control and take the team to new heights and build on the heritage and success in the 80s and 90s the harsh reality is that lotus in formula one really died with colin chapman and although throughout the 80s the team had some success with players such as ed and senna, elio deangelis and nelson pk, finishing third in the constructors' championship three times in 1984 86 and 87, the team was never again the same. from mclaren and ferrari had now overtaken them as the superpowers of formula one and it didn't take long for lotus to quickly disappear from the field and for its racing pedigree to simply

become

its history in recent years, the cars themselves were They sort of became billboards for all the sponsors they could find just to stay afloat financially, but the performance of the car just wasn't there.

The once great team at the forefront of technical innovation was no longer there and the results simply weren't there. They were also up to their eyes in debt and went bankrupt at the end of 1994 and even in that season they had seven different drivers and when all the legal administration processes had been completed a year later it was discovered that they had a deficiency owing over £12 million. The original Lotus team, at one time the best team in formula one, left despite their fall. lotus in name however returned to formula one controversially 16 years later, but it was not the lotus team we knew, it was new teams trying to use the lotus brand, which a season later resulted in two different teams in 2011 , they both used the name lotus, if you remember, at the beginning of the video I mentioned that the lotus team was separated from lotus engineering, which later became known as the lotus group.

This meant that the Lotus team was the racing team we all know and the Lotus group was the road car division. However, they are both completely separate companies and it is these two separate entities that 60 years later caused two teams to be named Lotus in 2010. when a Malaysian businessman called Tony Fernandez was granted an entry for a new formula team one, the lotus group granted him a license to use the lotus name in formula one and therefore for the2010 season one of the new teams introduced was Lotus Racing which raced under a Malaysian flag in particular, however this was not the same as the famous Lotus team in late 2010, this is where things started to get very complicated. and it must be said that at this point there were lawsuits, litigation and trials involved that I won.

Let's not go into details, but to summarize, the Lotus group canceled the license at the end of 2010 for the team to continue using the Lotus name; However, the original Lotus team that competed in Formula One from 1958 to 1994 was the intellectual property of that original team when they left. F1 was actually bought by David Hunt, who was the younger brother of the legendary James Hunt. David Hunt then sold the rights to the Lotus team name to Tony Fernandez, who was able to once again regain the Lotus name for 2011, but was now able to call it. it team lotus at the same time by 2011, the lotus group had bought a majority stake in the renault f1 team and created its own lotus team renault formula one and what was even more confusing is that both lotus teams quote-on-quo They were driven. by renault motors in 2011, so there were two lotus renault teams that also had liveries that tried to remember the success of colin chapman's team.

From the 70s and 80s, both teams tried to harness every last drop of nostalgia and history of being associated with the Lotus name. In the end Tony Fernandez stopped using the team's Lotus brand after just one year and changed the team name to Caterham which was another car company he owned and I don't want to make it seem like Tony Fernandes didn't care at all. Lotus and their heritage in F1 because, although the team was nothing more than a simple marker, they had the right to call them Team Lotus after purchasing the name, but the team had no physical or even tangible connection with the famous Chapman team anymore. that because of his name and one of the reasons he only used it for one season. and then he changed it is because he didn't want to tarnish the name of the lotus team by running at the back of the field until the 2011 lotus renault team, they formally became only the lotus f1 team for the 2012 season and now with the world.

Champion Kimi Raikkonen joined the team after his two years out of the sport, they continued until 2015 until the team ran into financial problems again, at which point Renault bought them and brought back the Renault F1 team for 2016 and, of course, Of course, now in 2021, the same. The team still owned by Renault went Alpine in the end even though the name was thrown on the grid and despite the possibility of one day seeing the Lotus name in F1 again, the original team changed F1 and at one point in history he was on the verge of becoming. Britain's answer to the Ferrari Lotus should have become what McLaren is today, but it cannot be understated how much Colin Chapman's death derailed the team on a personal level.

Even just making this video, it actually makes me very sad remembering what happened. the lotus team because I have a great passion and a great affection for the lotus brand, both in terms of their F1 heritage and what they stood for, but also for their road cars, which I have always loved, some people and some teams leave a brand in the sport that changes it forever and this will always be one of the best examples because both lotus and colin chapman were truly unique, so guys, there you have it. I hope you enjoyed this video. Now let me know. your thoughts in the comment box below and of course don't forget to leave a like and hit the subscribe button.

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