Lotus has had a horrible 2014 season. Despite this, the team will keep their current driver lineup for another season. This means that Romain Grosjean and Pastor Maldonado will be driving the Lotus cars this season. With the same drivers, some would think that the 2015 results will be about the same compared to the 2014 season results. However, Lotus will be switching to the successful Mercedes power unit for the 2015 season. With the new, more powerful engine, the team will have a faster car that will be more capable of competing with the other teams.
Pastor Maldonado has received a reputation as a bad driver that constantly crashes. This reputation is based on a collection of accidents that he was involved in during his early racing years, including the 2012 Belgian Grand Prix start accident which took out many of the top drivers. Although his reputation isn’t completely gone, he has improved his racing skills and hasn’t crashed nearly as much in 2014. Hopefully this will continue for 2015. Despite the fact that he doesn’t crash as often, he is still unable to score points neither often nor consistently. He is the weak link of the Lotus lineup.
Romain Grosjean has had quite a bit of success during his career, but not in Formula One. Most of Grosjean’s success has come from the GP2 and Formula 3 series. He is the winner of seven championship titles in his twelve years of racing. He has been with Lotus for most of his time in Formula One, so this is the team that he is familiar with. He is capable of getting onto the podium and consistently scoring points, however, the performance of the 2014 car ruined his season and we didn’t see his regular performance. He will be up near the front, if the Lotus team can get the car working well.
Overall, Lotus doesn’t have the best lineup, but that can be expected considering how little success the team has had during its short Formula One life. The team should perform better this season, however, that won’t be because of the lineup as much as it will be because of the new Mercedes engine. They will not be able to compete for the World Constructors’ Championship title, as you have to be both consistent and able to win points. That is something that the Lotus team is not able to do with their current drivers.
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