F1 Fanatic

Since today is the day both teams have launched their cars (31/1/2011)
I want to know which Lotus team you are supporting.

I am personally supporting Lotus Renault because:

1. I feel the Team Lotus name should be left alone, its legacy should rest in peace along with its great founder Colin Chapman.

2. The Chapman family themselves are saying they do not want the Team Lotus name back. They are also supporting Lotus Renault.

3. Cocky claims such as this http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/89154 which I find very dis-respectful.

4. Mike Gascoyne has a big ego and is a bit full of himself.

5. The car and JPS livery look great.

The whole Lotus saga has got to the point where I just don’t care anymore.

I’m supporting the Gascoyne Lotus because I can appreciate what they have achieved as a team. Being called Lotus in their first year was an asset as it attracted attention that they may not otherwise have got, but they don’t need that now and Fernandes should just drop the whole thing. He doesn’t need the name, they’re a creditable team in their own right and the way he’s spouting on about history and legacy blah blah blah is ridiculous.

Lotus Renault are at least downplaying the whole heritage thing (poor attempt at a JPS livery aside) and getting on with the job. Bahar has every right to introduce Lotus as a sponsor of a team, although I do feel he could have gone about it in a more sensible way.

The whole thing is nothing more than a silly spat between Bahar and Fernandes which I suspect goes deeper than simple naming rights. I don’t care who gets to be Lotus as long as its not both of them.

I support (more) Team Lotus because it started from being new and got the respect of the others. Lotus Cars then decide it was an intelligent market strategy to have the name Lotus in F1 but decided to keep it for them rather than giving it to Fernandes, sponsoring another team and creating this chaos.

I’m supporting Virgin Racing as they started life as Manor, who gave Hamilton his break in Formula Renault (the year after Kimi left, funnily enough). And they’ve done more than any team to not be Lotus (Branson’s bet with Fernandes!)

I don’t care any more either way.

I like what Tony Fernandes and his team have managed to achieve in such a short time-frame, but I do think he’s dragging out the whole Lotus naming row a bit too much and trying a bit too hard to be liked which is putting some people off.

On the other hand I have to admire the honesty of Gerard Lopez who points out what I agree is probably the real reason TF is being so stubborn – if they change the team name now they lose their FOM money. He also admits that this is why they are happy to stay as Renault and that he was a Lotus fan as a child.

Of the 2 liveries, I prefer the Team Lotus green & yellow, though I am warming to the Renault black & gold each time I see it.

I’ll be supporting McLaren anyway so it doesn’t really matter too much – just so long as we have a full grid.

I support Team Lotus Renault, not Lotus Renault, because both teams are legally in the right (Fernandes has indeed got ownership of the “Team Lotus” name from David Hunt), and the fact that it is going to court even though both of them are realistically correct is ridicilous. It is Renault who are taking it to court.

Also, I am a huge Lotus Cars (part of Group Lotus, the sponsors of Renault) fan, and I really dislike that Dany Bahar feels that there is a Place for Lotus Cars in motorsport, not just F1 but if i recall he is taking it into NASCAR and/or Indy 500 (?) as well, and that is not what lotus is.

I am however grateful that Group Lotus decided to call themselves purely Lotus not Group lotus in the title sponsor…

Team Lotus for me. Renault are trying everything for people to like then. First they bring back a retro, if not great, JPS inspired livery. Then they bribe AUTOSPORT so that they call them the REAL Lotus. 3rd is just Bahar, he obviously wants the history and Group Lotus thinks of themselves as THE Lotus, when they’re not. Then they bring in Senna, as a reminder of the Team Lotus days. I then finally hear that former Lotus driver Nigel Mansell joins them as an ambassador along with the legenedary Jackie Stewart. Both drivers who are popular with the public. What will they do next, end the recession?

Forgot to say, will a consistant point scoring Team Lotus and a podium scoring (title challanging?) Lotus Renault be an embarasment to the name, given that the REAL Lotus’ last seasons in F1 were hardly world beating…