Eric Boullier: R31 is genuinely fast
The Lotus Renault GP team boss, Eric Boullier insists that the team’s new Formula 1 car is genuinely ‘fast and furious’.
The team driver, Robert Kubica who now lies at the hospital, uncertain about his racing future, marked the fastest lap on the third day of the first pre-season test session held last week at Valencia.
The team’s R31 was launched on the 31st of January, a day before the first test session held on the 1st of february, 2011 . As the team has declared earlier as well, this year’s car was far more competitive than the last season’s. Among
other advanced features, the R31 has an innovative front-exiting exhaust system, which is expected to give a tough competition to all the rivals on the track.
While talking about the new car Boullier said, "We did not try to just do a (good) laptime with soft tyres and a drop of petrol in the tank."
He further explained to the reporters, "It (the laptime) just came after we started to adjust the settings for the first time and (adjust) the car to the Pirelli tyres. The car became more comfortable for Robert, and he did his time.”
However, the unfortunate incident of Sunday might not allow the team to perform as brilliantly as they could have with Kubica. The 26-year-old met a very unfortunate accident last weekend during the Ronde di Andora rally, driving a Skoda Fabia near Genoa,
Italy.
The driver went off the track at high speed and hit a church wall with his side. The incident left him with multiple fractures in leg and hip-bone, a broken fore-arm and a completely crushed right hand.
Initially, there were speculations that the right hand might need to be removed, however, a seven hour long surgery involving more than half a dozen surgeons prevented the hand from being amputated.
Still, the future of the driver remains uncertain. As per reports his return to the track is not possible until the end of the 2011 season, if he manages to return to the sport at all.
His current team, Renault has recently signed a deal with the Malaysian car manufacturer company, Group Lotus, renaming itself as Lotus Renault GP. The team made a huge investment in its new car, and is looking forward to a very strong season ahead. However,
Kubica's absence from the team will surely put a huge dent in the team's Championship aspirations.
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