Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsLotus F1

Lotus ‘aiming to cause some surprises’

Lotus deputy team principal Federico Gastaldi says he wants the team “to cause some surprises” in 2015.

Following two consecutive years in which Lotus won races and secured podium finishes, 2014 yielded just 10 points in total as the team struggled under the new F1 regulations. Both the Renault power unit and the chassis itself were uncompetitive, but Gastaldi says the work that has gone in over the winter to bounce back should not be underestimated.

“We’re focused on our own challenges and we have good stability and potential,” Gastaldi said. “We’re aiming to cause some surprises in 2015, so thumbs up, looking forward to a fantastic and well deserved 2015.”

And Gastaldi says the difficulties Lotus faced in 2014 should leave it in much better shape for this season.

“It will be a huge, huge change from last year with this new engine with Mercedes. So for us it’s a fantastic step forward. Also, on the development of the car we started working very early in the middle of last year and we learned a lot from all the things going through last year. So we are hoping we should have a very competitive year.”

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.