The Lotus Evora Cup race car is the latest addition to the Lotus Motorsport racing stable. Fresh from its debut at the Autosport International racing car show in Birmingham the Evora Cup race car was given its first shake-down test at a wintery Snetterton circuit in Norfolk, UK on the 10th and 11th of February 2010.

Lotus Motorsport is conducting an extensive development program for the Evora Cup race car, with Jarno Trulli and his Race Engineer, Gianluca Pisanello bringing their vast racing, development and engineering experience to fine tune the latest Lotus mid-engined race car.

Jarno Trulli and Gianluca Pisanello provided specific input into the aerodynamic balance for slow, medium and fast corners, guidance on the racing setup of the suspension geometry and direction on the engine’s calibration.

After driving the Lotus Evora Cup for the first time, Jarno Trulli said, "I have enjoyed driving the road going Lotus Evora very much and I believe that the Evora Cup will be a very competitive race car package. It was very rewarding to be the first to drive the Evora Cup race car even though the snowy conditions at Snetterton were fairly challenging at times!"

Jarno continued, "The car will continue to be developed with new updates coming soon, but even after the initial drive it is obvious that the car has huge potential. I look forward to working with Lotus Motorsport in developing the car further and I know that my years of motorsport experience will help make the Evora Cup race car even better."

Claudio Berro, Director of Motorsport at Group Lotus plc stated, “It is a privilege to work on the development of the Evora Cup race car with such an experienced driver and engineering team as Jarno Trulli and Gianluca Pisanello and I believe that this collaboration will produce a great race car for a range of motorsport applications. It is a very exciting time for Lotus and I am honoured to be leading the motorsport programmes at Lotus, starting with the Lotus Evora Cup racing car and race series.

Gianluca Pisanello, Race Engineer for Jarno Trulli said, “I am impressed with the whole Evora Cup race car package, which demonstrates that the road going Lotus Evora is such a competent sports car in the first place and an excellent basis to develop a competitive race car.”

In the past a number of Lotus F1 drivers have successfully raced or assisted in the development of Lotus Cars including F1 World Champions Jim Clark and Nigel Mansell. Jim Clark was a great exponent of the three wheel drift in his Lotus Cortina, campaigning the Lotus to win the British Touring Car Championship in 1964. Whilst Nigel Mansell raced for Lotus he was involved in the development of the prototype Active Suspension Lotus Esprit.

The Evora Cup race car is an evocative sports car that will offer a great platform to race in high level motor sport. The GT4 race car will go on sale starting at £120,000 excluding taxes for the sprint racing version, with the endurance specification race car £150,000 excluding taxes.

The final design, aero’ package and techincal specifications will be presented at the Geneva Motorshow in March 2010.

For more information please check out  http://www.lotusevoracup.com

It was an exciting day, with Jarno enjoying a visit to the production facilities, meeting Lotus staff and driving the new Lotus Evora – the first Lotus he has ever driven!

Jarno was also given a special tour of the Classic Team Lotus workshops by Clive Chapman, son of Lotus founder Colin Chapman. During the visit to Classic Team Lotus Jarno viewed some of the most successful and iconic F1 racing cars of all time. The tour was steeped in Lotus heritage and included some of the F1 cars that helped Lotus to achieve 79 GP wins, seven constructor’s titles and 6 drivers’ championships, including, Emerson Fittipaldi’s Type 72, Graham Hill’s Type 49 and Jim Clark’s Type 25.

Dany Bahar, CEO of Group Lotus plc said, “The family gets bigger with the arrival of Jarno. It was very special to host Jarno at Group Lotus, he is an exceptional driving talent and we wish him and Lotus F1 Racing every success for the 2010 F1 season.”

Dany Bahar continued, “We take great pride in the sports cars that we produce at Hethel and Jarno’s visit provided a great opportunity to show off the multi-award winning cars that we produce and the advanced niche production facilities at Hethel.”

Jarno had a fantastic time driving the Lotus Evora and visiting the home of the iconic Lotus marque, commenting, “Gino Rosato and I come from the same region of Italy, Abruzzo, we have been close friends for years and it was always a dream of ours to work together. Claudio Berro and Dany Bahar are also old friends and I honestly never thought that I would get the opportunity to work with these great people.”

He went on to say,” It was a great occasion and I thoroughly enjoyed seeing all the fantastic Classic Lotus F1 cars and new Lotus models. The facilities at Group Lotus are very impressive and I was amazed at the dedication and craftsmanship that goes into the production of Lotus cars. The Lotus Evora lived up to all my expectations of what a Lotus would be like to drive. It is clearly a very well engineered car that provides an exceptionally rewarding drive and I am looking forward to Lotus’ exciting future.”