Lotus should be even stronger at Monza – Grosjean

2015 Italian Grand Prix

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Romain Grosjean says Monza should be an even stronger track for Lotus than Spa, where he scored the team’s first podium finish of the season on Sunday.

“On paper, Monza should suit our car better than Spa,” said Grosjean, “so in theory a podium could be possible again.”

“Of course, we don’t know how our performance relative to our rivals will stack up until we get there, but I’m certainly going out for the strongest result possible, as I always do.”

“You need your car to be as slippery as possible and quick in a straight line,” he added, “and in that regard we’ve looked pretty strong so far in 2015.”

“Then we have to manage the tyre degradation. Also for us it will be tricky in the big corners like the Lesmos and the Ascari chicane because the less downforce you have then the more difficult it is to get good grip in the turns.”

Grosjean inherited third place at Spa after Sebastian Vettel suffered a tyre failure on the penultimate lap. However Grosjean believes he had a strong chance of passings the Ferrari in the final laps.

“I was closing in on him pretty quickly and I’d have done everything I could to get past him,” said Grosjean. “He’s a pretty tough competitor, but I was very determined at that point.”

“It’s only a shame that he did have his tyre issue on track as I was really looking forward to fighting him for that position and I’m convinced I would have taken the final podium spot.”

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    Keith Collantine
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    31 comments on “Lotus should be even stronger at Monza – Grosjean”

    1. “I was closing in on him pretty quickly and I’d have done everything I could to get past him,” said Grosjean. “He’s a pretty tough competitor, but I was very determined at that point.”

      If he was doing everything then that tells me he would not have gotten past. Vettel still had the upper hand and Grosjean was twice in DRS and it didn’t even look like he was gaining at all in the last two laps.

      1. Apparently Lotus had persuaded Mercedes (the engine half) to give Grosjean full beans for the laps after Vettel’s tyre blew, I think he would have got past due to the lack of grip causing a mistake of some sort from Seb.

        1. He was already start 7 for some laps before the blowout.

        2. @williamstuart And forcing a mistake from Seb seems unlikely.

            1. It happens. Once or twice every blue moon. But it doesn’t change the fact that it’s unlikely. But, Grosjean should definitely go for it in any case. So, it doesn’t matter to him.

      2. Have to agree, Vettel fended him off twice, he was probably going to do it one more time.

      3. @xtwl, I’m not a native English speaker, but can’t “I’d have done everything” be read as I WOULD have done everything? So he might have had some cards up his sleeve.

        1. @matthijs Like a mad outbraking move into Les Combes or the busstop? Or like a few extra bhp he wasn’t using on his first two attempts? I think the first one as the latter one will most likely have been used to get close and/or past. To me it seemed Vettel was going to finish third.

          1. It looked like Grosjean was further than ever by the time Vettel’s tyre blow up in his face.

    2. And accordingly we should see MB lap up to 3rd place, with a 1.20s or so lap. I just hope McLaren can avoid being lapped enough times to be nonclassified.

    3. I think Grosjean gone berserk.

      1. No, he has finished third.

      2. I agree. Lotus should not suit Monza better than their fellow Merc competitors in SFI and Williams because at Monza you need besides power and efficient aero package, great braking and the Lotus is not good at that.

        1. You say that after the race which proves quite the opposite. Lotus was a faster car than Ferrari at Spa, was it fast enough to pass Ferrari we’ll never know. Regarding Monza, Williams will be a complete write off. Their aero package is based on high drag and relies it’s efficiency upon ‘torqueish’ Mercedes PU. Besides, the weather forecast for the race weekend is rain, all three days ( yr.no) . I agree that Lotus’ aero is not where it should be but braking stability is not the issue of E23. Neither is mechanical grip. I’m looking forward to another competitive showing from Enstone squad.

          1. Their aero package is based on high drag

            Does it? Don’t the usually have higher speed trap speeds than Mercedes? While also less downforce? Those aren’t characteristics of a high drag chassis.

          2. Boomerang I bet Lotus is going to be at least on par with SFI probably, the slowest Merc car on the grid. Okay on traction, bad on mechanical, poor on braking. Great on aero efficiency and high speed grip. At SPA there’s a compromise, Monza is even more lopsided. Monza is more of a power circuit but I’ll bet that at least in qualifying the Ferrari and the RBR will be ahead of the Lotus.

            1. Paint of Guinness, very cold please.
              I don’t get your reasoning though. The car is performing much better with low downforce levels and you say it has poor mechanical grip. It is obvious that mechanical side of the car is very sound. Their problem lies in aero performance, which is major performance differentiator in F1. Running a wind tunnel is very expensive and I believe they’ve been strongly hit by financial issues, consequently unable to develop aero the way it was planed. I’m sure Scuderia will spend zilions to prepare good package for Monza but I also believe the problems encountered at Spa will be emphasised at Monza. RBR with engine penalty? Need I say more?
              Albert, the greatest portion of drag comes from wings. Look at the size of Williams’ rear wing. I know it helps diffuser to extract more air under the car but that’s a very ‘dragish’ approach. Even Christian H. was a bit sarcastic about it. They have a good top speed and a huge rear wing that’s the fact. The reason is only because their engineers got it right with the gearbox end-ratio combined with Mercedes’ PU torque. Their performance in wet conditions says it all about mechanical grip of the chassis. No need to spend a word about it.

            2. The reason is only because their engineers got it right with the gearbox end-ratio combined with Mercedes’ PU torque. Their performance in wet conditions says it all about mechanical grip of the chassis. No need to spend a word about it.

              This is a terrible explanation :/

          3. Why on earth William won’t bring a one-off package to Monza? (which EVERY team will do)
            Williams also ran big wings at Spa last year, and very quick at Monza, do you know these?

    4. I have a wild idea. The reason Lotus was so quick, had to do with them not being concerned about maintaining engine life. With the bailiffs coming, I guess they figure they have less to lose, since the cars can be impounded at any time.

      1. According to SFI, Lotus is generally in front of them in their calculations, the Lotus team seem to fail to deliver.

    5. I can’t imagine how frustrating it must be to design, build, develop and bring to the grid an F1 car, the result of hundreds of people working flat out, and then have to let Pastor get in it.

      1. Maldonado’s the source of many an easy joke, and often rightly so, but his sponsorship dollars have helped design, develop and build the car in the first place.

        It would be nice if he brought a bit more talent / maturity to the party too though.

    6. *Renault

      Ok, not quite yet.

    7. They have more chance on this track than the other tracks.

    8. GRO is delusional.

      If VET tyre hadn’t blown he would not have gotten past. In fact, on lap 42 he fell back further than previous three laps. VET had his number. He was too tentative on braking down the straights where he had DRS, I don’t think he even got close enough once to making a move or show a front wheel. Ireckon he was scared about having an incident while solid points were in the bag.

      1. Delusional is a little strong. He got a grid penalty in Spa, which put him at P9 and he worked his way up to P4. So it’s not too deluded of him to think that he car repeat last weekends performance if he qualifies in the top 5 at Monza.

        Let the Vettel tyre blowout issue go…

    9. RBR could have a engine change coming up which might put them back a few places on the grid which might help Lotus,

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