1985 Lotus Type 97T chassis 97T/2

Gérard Ducarouge’s design evolution continued with the Type 97T for 1985.

• Team Lotus manufactured four Type 97T chassis for the 1985 season
• The Type 97T score three GP victories during the year.
• Ayrton Senna raced this actual car to victory in the 1985 Portuguese GP at Estoril. He drove a brilliant race in atrociously wet conditions to score his first Grand Prix win.
• For Team Lotus it was the first Grand Prix victory since the death of its founder, Colin Chapman, in 1982.
• Ayrton considered this brilliant performance to be his best ever race. He rejected the suggestion that Donington 1993 was his greatest drive
• 1.5-litre, Renault EF-15 V6 Turbo
• Horsepower: 850bhp
• Weight: 539kg
• Top speed: 208mph
• Drivers: Senna, De Angelis
• The carbon-fibre chassis is very light and very stiff
• The resultant power to weight ratio is about 20 times that of a normal production road car
• New regulations required the car to incorporate a deformable nose section which acted as crash protection
• Vertical deflectors ran backwards from the front wing endplates and inside the front wheels to smooth airflow around the side-pods. These were the forerunners of what we know today as barge boards or turning vanes – another Team Lotus innovation ahead of its time
• Elio de Angelis raced 97T/2 in the Austrian GP that year and finished fifth
• Derek Warwick and Johnny Dumfries also drove this car in testing