(Lotus F1 Team)
The Lotus F1 Team had another great race following on from
scoring their first points of the season last weekend in China, Romain Grosjean
picked up another points finish as he ended the Bahrain night race in 7th
place to give the Enstone outfit 6 points. Speaking following the race the
Frenchman who started the race from 10th place stated:
‘It had been
a tough weekend until now for me, so it was really great to get another strong
seventh position. Today’s race was great, especially as there was lots of
overtaking. I was really hoping to catch Daniel Ricciardo but he was too quick for
us today. It was quite difficult to manage tyres, especially with the rears so
I think we did a good job to make the two-stop strategy work. We only had new
medium compound tyres for the race, the rest were scrubbed, so it really was a
great job by the team. It was a good recovery from Friday and Saturday’s
session and I’ll happily take seventh place as my birthday gift for myself and
the team.’
Despite recording the fastest pit-stop of the race Pastor
Maldonado struggled in Bahrain and finished the Grand Prix in 15th
place having started the race from 16th. Speaking following the race
the Venezuelan who had an issue in his final pit-stop stated:
‘That was a frustrating race for me. I pushed as
hard as possible at the start on the medium tyres whilst everyone around me was
on the grippier soft compound rubber. Once I moved to the soft tyres I was able
to set the race’s then fastest lap so things looked good with our strategy.
Unfortunately the engine anti-kill triggered when I came in to make my final pit
stop which cost me a lot of time. It’s frustrating as we should have finished
strongly. My focus is now Barcelona where I’ve delivered very strongly in the
past.’
The head to the Barcelona Circuit Du Catalunya for the start
of the European season at the Spanish Grand Prix in three weeks in 6th
place in the championship on 12 points, just seven behind the Sauber F1 Team.
Speaking following the race Lotus Deputy Team Principal Frederico Gastaldi
stated:
‘Congratulations to Romain once more for a
strong race and thank you to the race team for some great pit work as well as
engineering over the weekend to get the car to Romain’s liking so he could
deliver today. It’s thanks to the hard work of everyone at Enstone that we can
score points like we did here in Bahrain. Pastor had a difficult race and we
need to investigate exactly what went wrong so we can improve for our next time
out.’
Lotus head to Barcelona with a significant upgrade package
for the E23 Hybrid however their rivals will also use the three week break to
fine tune their own cars ahead of the start of the European leg of the season.
Speaking following the Bahrain Grand Prix, Lotus F1 Team Trackside Operations
Director Alan Permane commented saying:
‘That was an excellent, straight-forward
copybook race from Romain. Unfortunately, we didn’t have the pace to challenge
the Red Bull of Daniel Ricciardo today but we were ahead of the rest of our
near rivals. We were able to complete some very quick pit stops, which helped
both drivers during the course of the race. For Pastor we ran with a different
strategy to most of the field, with a three-stop strategy, starting on the
harder medium compound Pirellis. This looked to be working very well and Pastor
should have finished around the same position as Romain however a five-second
pit stop penalty and the engine-kill activating when he entered the pits
extinguished any opportunity of a strong result.’
© Ben Johnston 2015
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