Lotus F1 Aims to Finish the Race in Bahrain

A few weeks ago, the technical director of Lotus F1 Team, Mike Gascoyne, insisted that his aims for the upcoming season is to become the best of the newly entrant teams of F1 and, by mid-season, start seeing some points on the scoreboard from one of its two drivers, Jarno Trulli and Heikki Kovalainen.

As far as the first goal is concerned – out-bettering HRT F1 and Virgin Racing – we can all agree that it's more realistic than the second. One proof is that the Malaysian backed team's aim for the season opening Bahrain Grand Prix is simply to finish the race with both cars.

“We are all looking forward to Bahrain. (...) Yes we are a little slower than the major leading teams, however we will get there, with passion, hard work and a clear vision – our aim for this first Grand Prix will be to finish and steadily but surely improve, race by race,” said the team's CEO Tony Fernandes in a preview for this weekend's race.

His thoughts were perfectly echoed by Gascoyne, who admitted that the T127 is certainly not as competitive as the already established F1 teams, but its level of reliability showed during the winter testing should get them to at least crossing the finish line.

“Our test season was extremely productive – in general we've had very good reliability, and the team is in very good shape going to the first race,” said the Lotus F1 Team technical, while veteran driver Jarno Trulli added: “It would be nice to score a point, but it is not going to be easy. We have to be realistic.”