Grosjean: “Best time working on setup and suspension”

After the double podium in Bahrain, Lotus continued to show a surprising state of form also in the F1 tests which concluded today at Mugello: Romain Grosjean finished in the lead for the second consecutive day and closed the F1 tests putting Red Bull and Ferrari behind.

The French driver said he was happy with the behavior of his E20 but also downplayed his best time: “It was another beautiful day today, I was lucky here at Mugello”, said Grosjean. “We continued to work on the car and acquired very important data. We made a big change to the setup at lunchtime, and everything went according to plan. Mugello requires a lot of commitment for the driver, so it was a very nice experience for me and quite challenging”.

However, the Frenchman explains that the Lotus did not run empty of fuel and the time came without looking for it: “We were running a specific component evaluation program, and we weren't specifically looking for the time, so it's satisfying to have gotten it. I'm happy with the progress we've made here in Italy, and I'm waiting to see how we go once in Barcelona.", concluded the young Frenchman. Track operations manager Alan Permane said it was a good test for the team, and some new parts had proven their worth. “After reviewing yesterday's data, we did a further comparison on our suspension setups," has explained. “The track conditions were better today than yesterday, it was hotter and it was very hard on the tyres: not in terms of degradation, but in the heat generated by the high speed. This taught us some interesting lessons that are applicable to the rest of the season. Mugello is a great circuit to do an aerodynamic evaluation, so it was time well spent here in Tuscany.", concluded the Lotus technician.

Lorena Bianchi