Gascoyne proud of Lotus effort

Date published : 12 Feb 2010 - 17:37:13

Lotus's technical chief Mike Gascoyne says he is extremely proud of his team after it unveiled its new car in London.The Lotus T127 was officially launched on Friday, culminating just a few months of very hard work from the team which gained an entry to race in Formula 1 later than the rest of the new squads.Gascoyne admitted it was a very special moment for him and thanked team owner Tony Fernandes for his trust."The launch of the car is a very proud moment for the design team and the whole team," said Gascoyne. "This one is very special for me personally for two reasons - firstly the Lotus name coming back into F1 is something very special. "I grew up in Norfolk and went to school five miles down the road from the original factory. I grew up in era when Lotus was winning races and championships, so the opportunity to work with this team is very special. But also it is the challenge of bringing a new team and a new car into F1 in such a short space of time."What this is about for me, and it is the first launch I have been to where the whole team is here, there is a fantastic buzz about this place, the whole team has given their heart and soul to this project. I want to thank Tony on behalf of the whole team to have the courage to back us and trust us. "We have a fantastic driver line-up who have put faith in the whole design team. I am proud to be up here on stage as a representative of that team, they have done a fantastic job."Italian Jarno Trulli, who was the first driver to be confirmed at Lotus, said he was fired up to tackle the challenge of making the team successful."It is a very emotional moment for me - it will be great to take Lotus back on track where Lotus belongs and I think we have a big challenge, but it is what we are aiming for. I am really fired up for it," he said.Trulli will be partnered by Heikki Kovalainen, who has joined Lotus after two years at McLaren.Kovalainen said: "It has been a fantastic effort from the whole team and when I went to see Mike and Tony for the first time, there were four people at the reception, I said to them 'Are you sure it will happen before Bahrain?' And they said fine. I cannot wait until next week when we start driving it and get down to business."