Lotus: Technical problems limit cars to 11 laps

2011 British GP team review

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Heikki Kovalainen reached Q2 for Lotus but glitches put both cars out of the race having completed just 11 laps.

Heikki KovalainenJarno Trulli
Qualifying position1721
Qualifying time comparison (Q1)1’34.923 (-1.533)1’36.456
Race position
Laps1/5210/52
Pit stops00

Lotus drivers’ lap times throughout the race (in seconds):

https://www.racefans.net/charts/2011drivercolours.csv

12345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031323334353637383940414243444546474849505152
Heikki Kovalainen129.778
Jarno Trulli131.753119.282118.269116.521116.186116.412116.1115.923115.491115.981

Heikki Kovalainen

With rain threatening in qualifying, Lotus seized an opportunity to make a rare appearance in Q2. Kovalainen delivered a rapid lap on soft tyres and the Toro Rosso pair didn’t have enough time to respond before the rain returned.

That got him into Q2, but he couldn’t make any further progress and started 17th.

He managed just one lap in the race as an electrical problem robbed him of fourth gear. Mike Gascoyne said: “It looks like Heikki suffered an electrical problem on his gearbox which caused him to lose fourth gear so we had to pull him in and retire him.

“It was definitely not a problem with the gearbox itself so we need to take a close look at what went wrong on our side and make sure it does not happen again.”

Jarno Trulli, Lotus, Silverstone, 2011

Heikki Kovalainen 2011 form guide

Jarno Trulli

Trulli was out-qualified by Timo Glock and lost another place to Vitantonio Liuzzi at the start.

He was running two seconds behind Glock when he was forced to retire on lap 11. “We instructed him to stop as he had an oil leak and lost pressure so we had to end his race early to ensure we did not damage the engine,” said Gascoyne.

Karun Chandhok

Drove Kovalainen’s car in first practice.

Jarno Trulli 2011 form guide

2011 British Grand Prix

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    Image © Pirelli

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    26 comments on “Lotus: Technical problems limit cars to 11 laps”

    1. Wish you are the real lotus not airasia

      1. meh…

        by now we should have past this real or not real lotus argument

        just move on and get over it.

        and by the way it was their McLaren ECU that failed on Heikki’s car as mentioned by Tony on his tweeter. and I never knew Team Lotus use McLaren ECU unit on their cars

        1. Everyone does, it’s standardized.

        2. It’s a standard unit supplied to the FIA by Mclaren. It’s on all the cars.

        3. That’s why it is called Standard ECU. even Ferrari uses it.

      2. They’re actually doing better than the other “Lotus” in my opinion. Renault have let down after two podiums, Lotus look like having had good progress from 2010.

        1. I agree with you, Fixy. Where as Renault have become slower and slower, Lotus are actually showing signs of progress; they’d arguably make more progress if they dumped Trulli.

          1. And picked up who exactly?

        2. Relatively, they probably are…not counting this race ;)

      3. Does it matter? They are a team that did an impressive Qualifying and looks serious about getting higher up the grid.

        Not their sunday, they still have reliability issues. But its not as if the other team with a Lotus badge on them were doing that much better in Silverstone.

    2. CEO of lotus should stop wasting time in indycar and focus on f1!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

      1. That Lotus is focusing on the team called Renault though Indy Lotus is same livery to Team Lotus.

      2. It’s Group Lotus that are involved in IndyCar, not Team Lotus.

      3. you are one very confused lad
        Is your real name dany bahar by the way?

        1. The green Lotus in IndyCar is the same Lotus as the green and yellow bits on the black and gold Renault in F1, but not the green and yellow Lotus in F1.

          But the green and yellow Lotus in GP2 is the same Lotus as the green and yellow bits on the black and gold Renault in F1, not the green and yellow Lotus in F1, which is the same as the white and red car in GP2. The yellow and black car in GP2 is the same as the gold and black bits of the Renault in F1, sort of, which is what colour it was last year.

          Clear as mud.

          1. I like that explanation, it makes it so much clearer why we all car about it a lot :)

          2. Don’t forget the team that is now green/yellow in GP2 was actually sporting a white/red livery pretty much like the one now run by the white/red team affliated with the green/yellow car team in F1 which now has a white Caterham on it :-)

          3. See ajokay gets it!

            Brilliant mate, Brilliant.

          4. Easy. Got it down.

          5. And I have to update this, as the red and white cars in GP2 are now going to be green and yellow, the same as the green and yellow F1 cars, but not the other green and yellow GP2 cars, which are still the same as the green and yellow bits on the black and gold F1 cars.

            1. and this is what these formerly white and red GP2 cars will look like, not to mistake them with the other formerly white and red cars that are already running green and yellow in GP2 who look like this

              got that?

    3. Very disappointing after impressive qualifying. I think it’s time to change Trulli. I liked him but he never show anything better than last year. actually it gets worse. Now it’s time for Chandhok…

      1. He must had had some decent running on Friday, I didn’t hear of any problems. He’s had plenty so far.

    4. have to say Trulli has been pretty poor this year. Seems to have lost all motivation and constantly complaining- can’t be good for the morale of the team.

    5. Great that Kovalainen managed to jump STR but didn’t get the chance to perform in the race.

    6. Shame to see Lotus go out of the race so early on. I saw two Lotus helicopters leave pretty much straight after they were both out, hope it wasn’t the drivers leaving that early

    Comments are closed.