HRT will not cooperate with Team Lotus

The information put forward by the Swiss weekly Sport Week has not been denied by an official statement from the Spanish team. They were based on the fact that Cosworth had not announced an engine supplier for the first list released by the FIA.

A collaboration with Team Lotus (which will become Caterham next year) could have been an opportunity to change engine suppliers, abandoning the Cosworth engine for Renault. The French engine will also be used by Williams starting next year. However, the team from Grove has established a partnership with the Iberian outfit concerning gearboxes and transmissions. This hypothesis would have been supported by the fact that Tony Fernandes and Mike Gascoyne have taken control of the former Toyota F1 factory in Cologne.

Nevertheless, these hypotheses face some constraints not only regulatory but also practical. Although Toyota indeed left F1 at the end of the 2009 season, the world’s largest manufacturer has not abandoned its ambitions in motorsports. It is in this context that it re-engaged in a Le Mans program, which materialized in the 2012 edition of the 24 Hours. To do this, it uses the infrastructure of Toyota Motorsport GmbH, specifically those of the former F1 team. It is therefore unlikely that they have been transferred to other stakeholders…

Furthermore, the FIA regulations now prohibit customer chassis: each team must develop its own car and cannot acquire it from other teams. This is what pushed Toro Rosso to undertake significant technical recruitment following its separation from Red Bull Racing. This is what Colin Kolles’ team wanted to clarify: “After the recent information that has appeared in the media, HRT F1 Team is obliged to deny that Caterham Technology and Innovation, a subsidiary of Caterham F1, will be responsible for the design and manufacture of the F112 chassis. Contrary to what has been published, the development of the car with which HRT F1 Team will compete in next year’s Formula 1 World Championship is being carried out in the team’s technical office in Munich by a team of designers under the technical supervision of Jacky Eeckelaert and chief aerodynamicist Stephan Chosse.”

After two seasons finishing in eleventh place in the championship, HRT also wishes to accelerate its development. To do this, participating in winter testing for the first time would allow them to have a racing car that has benefited from at least some track time before the official season begins. This is the goal set by the team’s members, even though new regulatory constraints could hinder its achievement: “Despite very tight deadlines and a change in rules for 2012 requiring that crash tests and chassis homologation procedures be completed before a car participates in testing, the team hopes that the new car will be ready for preseason testing in February.”

Now remains to formalize the continuation of the relationship with Cosworth as well as the appointment of Pedro de la Rosa’s teammate…

With the participation of RacingBusiness.fr