Jump to content
  • Welcome to Midlands Lotus Owners Club (MLOC)

    Register now to gain access to all of our features. Once registered and logged in, you will be able to contribute to this site by submitting your own content or replying to existing content. You'll be able to customize your profile, receive reputation points as a reward for submitting content, while also communicating with other members via your own private inbox, plus much more!

    This message will be removed once you have signed in.

Mark H
Mark H

2013 Italian Grand Prix, Sunday

Lotus F1 Team fought back from a disappointing qualifying session yesterday to show strong race pace, finishing the Italian Grand Prix in eighth and eleventh positions. After an eventful first corner, Kimi Räikkönen pitted for a new front nose cone and tyres whilst Romain Grosjean continued despite a rear-end onslaught from another car. Following his first lap pit stop, Kimi was the second fastest car through the race, with a determined drive including multiple fastest laps. Kimi finished in eleventh, hounding the McLaren of Jenson Button ahead, whilst Romain finished in eighth place, withstanding considerable pressure from Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes behind. Kimi remains in fourth in the Drivers’ Championship on 134 points, with Lewis Hamilton ahead on 141 and Mark Webber behind on 130 points. The team remains in fourth place in the Constructors’ Championship on 191 points from Ferrari’s 245 and well ahead of fifth-placed McLaren who have 66 points.

  • Kimi started from P11 with a new set of hard tyres, changing to new medium compound tyres on lap 1 where he also received a new front wing, and scrubbed medium tyres on lap 30.
  • Romain started from P13 on a new set of medium tyres, changing to a new set of hard compound tyres on lap 20.

Kimi Räikkönen, P11, E21-03

 

“When I lost the front wing I had to come in and change to a new one meaning an extra pit stop which we hadn’t planned. It’s not just the time in the pits, but you have to work your way through the field afterwards. We did a pretty good job of that and the car felt good, surprisingly good given where we were on Saturday. Unfortunately, there’s not much you can do after the start to the race we had.”

Romain Grosjean, P8, E21-02

 

“It isn’t easy to follow another car with the aero configurations that we had for the race here but we got the best result we could have done having started in P13. Unfortunately we had a poor pit stop where we had an electronic problem and the light didn’t turn to green, so we lost a few seconds there. I think we could have come out in front of the two McLarens and the Toro Rosso, which would have made things a bit easier for a stronger result. I had a good battle with Lewis on the last lap. I think we did the best we could here in Monza and I hope that for Singapore we can get back to the level of performance that we had in Budapest.”

Eric Boullier, Team Principal

 

"If you want to be competitive for the Championships you need to be able to fight every weekend at the front on Saturday as well as on Sunday. The positive from this weekend is that we showed fantastic race pace and both drivers drove exceptionally well. Romain withstood great pressure and performed great overtaking moves on both McLarens. Kimi fought back from a first lap incident in a superb display of his talents. The negative from this weekend is that we couldn’t qualify where we needed to be. The results at the end of the race aren’t rewarding for the team, but there are plenty of positives to take from the final European race of the season and we head to the final flyaway races with plenty of fight.”

Alan Permane, Trackside Operations Director

 

“Our damage was done yesterday by our poor qualifying positions. We actually had good race pace today and if you compare Kimi and Sebastian Vettel’s races, after Kimi’s first stop we only lost a second to Seb and we gained four seconds on Fernando [Alonso]. Seb won the race and Fernando finished second, so that gives an illustration of what could have been. We obviously will be dissecting where we lost the pace on Saturday and have some solace that we don’t visit another circuit of this level of downforce for the rest of the season as it certainly wasn’t beneficial for us in terms of qualifying. Starting where we did put us in the middle of the pack where incidents happen on the first lap and that was the case for both our drivers, but both made great recoveries.”

Ricardo Penteado, Renault Sport F1 Team Support Leader

“Monza is always a tough race for engines with a high percentage of the lap spent flat out. Today the race was even harder. Kimi’s early stop meant he went down the pack and had to fight to regain position. Fuel consumption was considerably higher than that expected as a result, so we had to manage the settings very carefully to give him the power he needed to fight without running dry. Sadly he missed the points by under a second – on the strength of his drive he really deserved it and the car had the pace to score. Romain did a great job to keep hold of eighth, which is a more representative indication of where we are this weekend.”

User Feedback

Recommended Comments

There are no comments to display.



Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Add a comment...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.


  • Newbie question

    As the title suggests , a newbie query. I have just bought an S2 Elise , 2007 with the Toyota 1ZZ power unit in ‘ touring spec’. That means electric windows, a radio and , err, not sure what else. Anyway, that is not the subject of the query. The car is blue with a cream interior. The latter I don’t plan to keep. In fact , already bought some equivalent second hand door cards in black and am looking hard at a pair of Corbeau LE seats . So, first part of my query centres on those Corbeau seats. A

    Andy wright
    Andy wright
    General Talk 165

    Using LED projectors in a lotus S2

    Hello guys. I am surprised there is not more on here about using Led Projectors for the dip beam in the US you can get the ORE kit which is still a bit pricy.  I beleve he found a good unit that people can retrofit, and provided the extra brackets to adapt it. Link I am trying some brighter bulbs for now, but do think there must be a reasonably proces solution to go LED with somthing reliable, and fassion our own brackets. I can do CAD and many people will cut seel to a drawing for

    William D8on
    William D8on
    Technical Talk 6

    Learn to repair clamshell myself

    Hi 👋  I have recently brought a damaged exige 430cup and the front clam needs repairs.   I’ve started to repair cars a couple years ago and gaining more confidence to have ago myself. I have never done fibre glass repairs, but wondered if anyone in the midlands can give me some tips on how best to get started?      Thks 

    JDUK
    JDUK
    Technical Talk 3

    Bilstein Repair Service

    Hi A couple of weeks ago my 2008 Elise failed its MOT due to leaking rear Bilstein dampers. A look on elise parts and they were £330 incl Vat each without the springs, so I decided to look at my options and found out that Bilstein offer a rebuild service. Dropped them of at their service centre in Leicester last Monday, picked them up yesterday. £140 incl vat per damper for new seals, pistons, gas and oil plus a degrease so less than half the cost of new ones. Very good

    Badger02
    Badger02
    Technical Talk 16

    Calendar 2025

    It’s arrived !   Great job of the Calender fella’s.  Some excellent photos, well done everyone 👍🏻

    Oakman
    Oakman
    General Talk 5
  • MLOC garage

  • Member Statistics

    4,352
    Total Members
    1,800
    Most Online
    William D8on
    Newest Member
    William D8on
    Joined
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue. Terms of Use