Lotus revive original team name for 2011 season

Lotus are yet to pick up a point in this year's championship

By Andrew Benson
BBC Sport at Monza

The Lotus Formula 1 outfit will take on the historic name Team Lotus next year, BBC Sport has learned.

Team principal Tony Fernandes has bought the naming and heritage rights to Team Lotus and will enter and race the cars under that name in 2011.

Team Lotus were a leading force in F1 in the 1960s and 1970s and are one of the most successful teams in history.

They fell out of F1 in 1994 with financial problems but Lotus re-entered F1 this year under Malaysian ownership.

Fernandes has been keen to stress the links between his new team and the historic Lotus, which was founded by Colin Chapman and won a series of six drivers' titles and seven constructors' championships through the 1960s and '70s.

The rights to the Team Lotus name were bought by businessman David Hunt - brother of 1976 F1 world champion James Hunt - following the outfit's collapse in 1994.

Fernandes, 46, has now bought the rights from Hunt and will enter his team, backed by a consortium of Malaysian businessmen, under that name next year.

"The whole ownership structures of Lotus are very complicated, but we've unravelled them," Fernandes told BBC Sport.

"We want to own our own future and not license it from someone else. The future of Lotus Racing and Team Lotus is very secure and it is now in our hands."

The cars will sport the famous Team Lotus badge, bearing Chapman's initials, ACBC (for Anthony Colin Bruce Chapman).

The heritage rights include ownership of all the historic Lotus F1 cars. These are currently licensed to Chapman's son Colin, who has been supportive of Lotus's new iteration.

There are no direct links between the Lotus F1 team and the Lotus Cars company, which is owned by Malaysian company Proton.