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Today in history… Team Lotus makes its F1 debut

12:00am | & Lifestyle

This weekend brings an annual highlight on the Formula 1 calendar ­– the Monaco Grand Prix ­– and today marks 60 years since one of the most illustrious names in F1 made its debut at the famous street circuit.

Team Lotus, the motorsport wing of English sports car builder Lotus Cars, competed in its first Grand Prix race on May 18th, 1958, in Monaco. Over the next four decades it would become one of the most successful teams in F1 history, helped along the way by the likes of Jim Clark, Stirling Moss Graham Hill and Nigel Mansell.

Lotus Engineering Ltd was established in 1952 by automotive engineer Colin Chapman. Its distinctive logo still features the initials of his full name, Anthony Colin Bruce Chapman. It initially specialised in lightweight custom-built cars for privateer racers and trialists, but Chapman soon realised to best way to promote his cars was through an in-house racing outfit, and so Team Lotus was born.

Its production cars were soon dominating at Le Mans and similar events, and the decision was taken to enter the high-octane world of motorsport’s top tier, Formula 1. Two single-seat Lotus Type-12s were entered in the 1958 Monaco Grand Prix, one driven by Cliff Allison and the other by Graham Hill. British cars dominated the race that year, won by Maurice Trintignant at the wheel of a Cooper, while Allison crossed the line in sixth place (13 laps behind the winner) and Hill finished in 26th.

Chapman learned from the success of the other cars, especially the Cooper, and put the Type 12 through a series of revisions and modifications. It took two years and a lot of hard work, but at the 1960 Monaco Grand Prix Stirling Moss drove the evolved Lotus Type 18 to victory in what would be the first of many wins for the company. In 1963, just five years after Team Lotus’s F1 debut, Jim Clark won its first World Driver’s Championship, marking the start of a golden era for Lotus.

Both Clark and Hill scored multiple F1 titles and in 1960 Clark took America by storm when he drove a Lotus to victory at its premier race event, the Indianapolis 500. It wasn’t just British drivers lining up to pilot a Lotus – other racing legends signed to the marque included Jochen Rindt, Emerson Fittipaldi, Mario Andretti and a young Ayrton Senna.

Just as Chapman had hoped, his company’s success in motorsport made its production sports cars highly desirable. One, a Lotus Esprit, even usurped Aston Martin to appear as 007’s car of choice in the 1977 Bond movie “The Spy Who Loved Me”. Unlike standard Esprits, this one could operate equally well underwater.

Throughout the 1960s and ’70s Team Lotus dominated motorsports, not just in F1 but in several other racing classifications. The cars were continually evolving and often a step ahead of their rivals. The only criticism levelled at Lotus was that its lightweight cars were too fragile in a crash, with a string of drivers seriously injured or killed at the wheel of Lotus machines. New F1 safety regulations, pushed for by drivers led by Jackie Stewart, eventually levelled the playing field in this area.

Many of Chapman’s innovations were game-changing, including his use and development of lightweight but strong carbon fibre. Some were so ground-breaking that they were initially banned, though other teams quickly emulated and incorporated his designs. When Chapman died of a heart attack in 1982, aged just 54, it was a massive blow to the team.

It continued under his widow Hazel and manager Peter Warr, but some of the old magic had gone. Even the remarkable skills of young Brazilian driver Ayrton Senna, who signed for Lotus in 1984, could not revive the team’s flagging fortunes. He scored some memorable individual F1 victories, but consistency eluded Lotus and in 1988 Senna left to join rival British team McLaren.

In the 1990s a new Team Lotus was launched, no longer directly connected with the Chapman family, and enjoyed some success, especially with ‘Flying Finn’ Mika Hakkinen and Brit Johnny Herbert in the driving seat, but F1 was now incredibly expensive and the team’s constant struggle for finance affected its performance on the track. In 1994 the company went bust, although the historic name was sold on and made a brief reappearance in F1 in 2010/11.

With more than 50 Grand Prix wins under its belt, Lotus remains a legendary name in Formula 1.

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