Book Description

The bigger they are, the harder they fall" is how the old saying goes and while most of the time that is true the once-mighty Team Lotus was the exception. Because Lotus' decline was unusual: it was not a spectacular, swift or a sudden affair. Instead, it was a death by a 1000 cuts spanning years if not decades. During which time drivers were calling the shots, resources not allocated efficiently, race-winning technologies squandered, and questionable investments made. But could all this have been avoided and if so who or what should take the blame? A new book explores...Team Lotus: Beyond the Colin Chapman Era tells a tale that has been criminally under-reported. Lotus' decline, and its death by 1,000 cuts. It contains approx. 500 pages (kindle size) with over 150 rare photos. In short it will be comparable to my last book, 1994 - The Untold Story. Given all the positive reviews of that, you can expect this new book to be a great read, please look out for any reviews if you don't believe me. Contributors towards it include: Frank Dernie - Lotus' Technical Director Between 1989/90.Peter Wright - The man behind Lotus' active suspension during the 1980s.Antony Hayes - Historian for Team Lotus, and someone who worked there during the 1980s & 1990s.Willem Toet - Designer of championship-winning Benetton's and Ferrari F1 cars & F1 aerodynamics/wind tunnel expert.Nigel Beresford - Tyrrell's Race Engineer to Palmer, Alesi and Modena between 1989-1991 I'll add any reviews of this E-book here in due course so readers can make an informed decision. Peter Wright has read some of the draft and calls it an "interesting read." So what will be contained in this book? It focuses on the years from 1983 to the end of 1989 because we may produce a follow up book investigating Lotus' final years of 1990 - 1995. The reason they aren't in a single book is simple; this decline story is one that needs to be covered in detail. Remember there are 1000 cuts to cover. The book guides readers through all of Team Lotus' races between 1983 to the end of the 1989 F1 Season. This is to identify how the team bounced back after the death of their founder and inspiration, Colin Chapman, and to work out where their decline began. But it's also just an excuse to relive what was a great period of F1, the original turbo era. The book itself is full of detail, insights and written by someone passionate about this subject matter. An essential ingredient for a good book.This book is not shy in telling readers how things might have been done differently. It has many exclusives and is controversial in its findings. There are important lessons to be learned from a team's downfall, and that was certainly the case with Lotus as readers will come to learn. l've worked hard since the abridged version of this book (released in January 2020) to ensure any feedback from that has been implemented into this updated version. As a result this book is twice as long & detailed as that abridged version. I believe this book provides outstanding value for money for the content you are getting.