#lotus98t

The Lotus 98T is finally back in action. To commemorate the life of Ayrton Senna Martin Brundle drove the car at Donington on Tuesday 8th April for Sky’s forthcoming coverage of the Spanish Grand Prix in addition to other features making up Sky’s Senna Week. Martin’s first outing in the car was for ITV some years ago but due to time constraints was only able to work up to about 70% performance over 4 laps.

On this occasion we let Martin, who was arch rival to Senna in Formula 3, drive the car to it’s full capability for over 25 laps of the Leicestershire circuit. At the end of the day he claimed “I could not have driven that car faster if I wanted to. You could bolt soft tires on it and qualify it.” While that prospect was a little scary these cars were designed to be fire-breathing monsters not museum pieces and to see and hear the car at full speed again was a great privilege.

The sight of Bruno Senna pulling out of pitlane was an erie reminder of the 1986 season and we were thrilled to have Damon Hill also experience the last of the unrestricted turbo engines.

Due to legislation we were asked to cover up the JPS branding which we achieved with the help of our friends at PTM Design. The finish, particularly on the carbon fibre wings, looked very convincing.

We are also very grateful to our friends at MCT and Classic Team Lotus who have been extremely supportive during a difficult rebuild.