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

Q&a With Eric Boullier

The Team Principal and Managing Director pays tribute to the efforts behind the scenes over the winter and looks ahead to the challenge facing the team in 2011.

 

Eric, the start of the 2011 season is just over a month away. How excited are you about the year ahead?

I think there is a great deal to be excited about this year, especially as we begin an important new era for this team. 2010 was a useful year; a time to rebuild and prepare for the future, but at the same time everybody in the team put in an amazing amount of effort and we saw the results of that on the racetrack. Now, with the arrival of a long-term partner in Group Lotus, we have the financial stability to build on these strong foundations and ensure a very competitive future. That is incredibly motivating for everybody in the team and gives us all the belief that we can continue to compete at the sharp end of the grid with the strongest teams in the sport. Over the last twelve months, we have all worked so hard to prepare for 2011 and I'm incredibly proud of what we have achieved and looking forward to getting the season underway.

 

The winter months building the new car are always some of the busiest of the year – how has the factory handled the creation of the R31?

In fact, Formula 1 never stops. With the R31, work started before the R30 had even done a single race. In 2010 we achieved a very high rate of development and the car that finished the season was two seconds per lap quicker than the car we had at the first race. During the winter, that same determined approach to the workload has continued, which is a testament to the spirit and commitment of the people we have in this team. Yes, the workload is huge at this time of year, but if we keep our heads down and maximise the winter test sessions, I'm pretty sure we will have a strong start to 2011.

 

Can the team repeat last year's high development pace in 2011?

The plan is to take exactly the same approach to development this year, although our expectation is to start the season in a much stronger position. That means we will have to be even more creative and will look to investigate some new technical areas that we have not examined before. But technical innovation isn't the only key to performance and over the last 12 months we have reviewed all our internal processes and left no stone unturned. Today we can say that our overall efficiency has improved by 15%.

 

The team is fielding an unchanged driver line-up. How important is that stability for taking the team forward?

Stability is important in any industry and especially in the very fast-moving Formula 1 environment, which is intensively competitive on every level. Having stability in our drivers is one of the key elements in bringing this team back to full competitiveness. It will allow us to capitalise on what we learned last year. The new management, the drivers, the engineers and mechanics have all been working together for a year now and have spent that time understanding each other. Now is the time when we can capitalise on that bond and team spirit, which will only make us stronger.

 

What do you think Robert and Vitaly are capable of achieving in 2011?

Our driver line-up is still a mixture of talent, experience and youth. Robert is clearly one of our strongest assets and we know we can rely on his speed, commitment and dedication for the long term. As for Vitaly, he showed us at the end of last year that he understands what we expect of him in 2011 and he was ready to commit to this. With a year's experience behind him, he will be able to approach the new season with more confidence and is ready to help the team raise its game. We took the risk of investing in him last year and I'm sure we will see the benefit of that this year.

 

Are you confident the team can take a significant step forward and challenge for wins in 2011?

We live to race and our goal is to win. It's the core of our philosophy. All the hard work over the last twelve months has been focussed on delivering a big improvement for 2011, and that means we should be more competitive than last year. Will we be stronger than our competitors? Hard to say, but based on the efforts of everybody here, I feel we deserve it.

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