(Andrew Ferraro/LAT for the Lotus F1 Team)
The Lotus F1 Team head into their final Grand Prix with Renault power following a mixed qualifying session which saw Pastor Maldonado qualify in 18th place while Romain Grosjean will start from the back of the grid after being handed a 20 place grid penalty on Friday.
The Frenchman had qualified for Sunday's race in 16th place. The Enstone outfit are currently in 8th place in the championship, 20 points behind the Toro Rosso team. Speaking in a Q&A after qualifying Lotus F1 Team Track Operations Director Alan Permane was stated:
How was qualifying for the team?
Qualifying was pretty representative of our entire season and we have plenty of work to do in the race tomorrow. Certainly we’re far closer to the front of the grid in terms of lap time than we were at the start of the season, however both drivers have a lot of cars ahead of them on the grid so we’ll be working hard on a strategy which enables us to make the most the race.
Romain has the additional challenge of starting from the back of the grid with a drive-through penalty too, so there’s no point being conservative with his strategy.
What are the positives heading into the race?
What are the positives heading into the race?
We have a pretty good past history in Abu Dhabi and the E22 looks quite reasonable in the longer runs so there is definitely potential to move forward over the course of the 55 laps. Both drivers are driving well and we’ve seen good reliability of late. We’ll all be giving it everything we’ve got.
© Ben Johnston 2014
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