Lotus Cars - Formula One

Formula One

The company encouraged its customers to race its cars, and entered Formula One through its sister company Team Lotus in 1958. A Lotus Formula One car driven by Stirling Moss won the marque's first Grand Prix in 1960 at Monaco in a Lotus 18 entered by privateer Rob Walker. Major success came in 1963 with the Lotus 25, which — with Jim Clark driving — won Lotus its first F1 World Constructors Championship. Clark's untimely death — he crashed a Formula Two Lotus 48 in April 1968 after his rear tyre failed in a turn in Hockenheim — was a severe blow to the team and to Formula One. He was the dominant driver in the dominant car and remains an inseparable part of Lotus' early years. That year's championship was won by Clark's teammate, Graham Hill.

Lotus is credited with making the mid-engined layout popular for IndyCars, developing the first monocoque Formula One chassis, and the integration of the engine and transaxle as chassis components. Lotus was also among the pioneers in Formula One in adding wings and shaping the undersurface of the car to create downforce, as well as the first to move radiators to the sides in the car to aid in aerodynamic performance, and inventing active suspension.

Even after Chapman's death, until the late 1980s, Lotus continued to be a major player in Formula One. Ayrton Senna drove for the team from 1985 to 1987, winning twice in each year and achieving 17 pole positions. However, by the company's last Formula One race in 1994, the cars were no longer competitive. Lotus won a total of 79 Grand Prix races. During his lifetime Chapman saw Lotus beat Ferrari as the first team to achieve 50 Grand Prix victories, despite Ferrari having won their first nine years sooner.

Formula One Constructors' Championships (Drivers' Championship winner for Lotus)

• 1963 (Jim Clark)
• 1965 (Jim Clark)
• 1968 (Graham Hill)
• 1970 (Jochen Rindt)
• 1972 (Emerson Fittipaldi)
• 1973
• 1978 (Mario Andretti)

Team Lotus established Classic Team Lotus in 1992, as the Works historic motorsport activity. Classic Team Lotus continues to maintain Lotus F1 cars and run them in the FIA Historic Formula One Championship and it preserves the Team Lotus archive and Works Collection of cars, under the management of Colin Chapman’s son, Clive.

Team Lotus' participation in Formula One ended at the end of the 1994 season.

The Lotus name returned to Formula One for the 2010 season, when a new Malaysian team called Lotus Racing, using the Lotus name on licence from Group Lotus, was awarded an entry. The new team was unrelated to the previous incarnation of Team Lotus when it was first founded, although it was funded by a Malaysian Consortium including Proton (the owner of Lotus Cars). After a dispute between the two parties (Lotus Racing and Proton), Group Lotus, with agreement from their parent company Proton, terminated the licence for future seasons as a result of what it called "flagrant and persistent breaches of the licence by the team". Lotus Racing then announced that they had acquired Team Lotus Ventures Ltd, the company led by David Hunt since 1994, during which Team Lotus had stopped competing in Formula One, and with it full ownership of the rights of the Team Lotus brand and heritage. The team confirmed that they would be known as Team Lotus from 2011 onwards.

In December 2010 Group Lotus (Proton) announced the creation of "Lotus Renault GP", the successor to the Renault F1 team, that contested the 2011 season having purchased a title sponsorship deal with the team with the option to buy shares in the future. The team's cars continued to be called "Renaults", up against the Team Lotus cars which were known as "Lotus". For 2012, "Lotus Renault GP" has been rebranded as "Lotus F1 Team" and their cars will be known as "Lotus", whereas the former Team Lotus has been renamed Caterham F1 Team and their cars will be known as "Caterhams".

Group Lotus is currently also involved in several other categories of motorsport. It sponsors the ART team in the GP2 and GP3 Series, and the KV team in the IndyCar Series. In 2011, Lotus also returned to the 24 Hours of Le Mans with a semi-works effort run by Jetalliance Racing, which fielded two Lotus Evoras. In 2012 they will partner with Engine Developments LTD/John Judd to build a 2.2 Liter Twin Turbocharged V-6 Engine to be used in the Izod Indycar Series.