Air had always flowed under racing cars, but it was not until 1977 that a racing car appeared that really took advantage of it. By incorporating inverted wings into each side of the car and critically, by sealing these to the ground with a vertical skirt Team Lotus rewrote the rules of single seater car design. While the Lotus 78 came close to winning the World Championship in 1977, it successor the Type 79 gave Lotus a season of real dominance wining six out of sixteen Grand Prix and taking Mario Andretti to the F1 World Championship. The following year though was a disaster, the Type 80 was a total failure and Lotus began a long slow fade that would result in the team disappearing at the end of 1994.
This book covers the genesis of the Types 78 and 79, the unsuccessful Type 80 and the ill-fated Type 88. As well as the strengths of the Team Lotus designs, this book casts a strong light on their weaknesses and makes the reasons of the team's loss of performance much clearer. Colin Chapman, head of Lotus, is painted as a flawed genius. A man able to grab a new idea and to inspire those around him to achieve new heights, whilst being unable or unwilling to see critical points himself. The story of the Type 80 is very illuminating; rather than producing an improved Type 79, Lotus innovated for innovations sake and produced a car physically totally unable to handle the loads its advanced aerodynamics imposed on it. It was left to less original teams such as Williams to produce improved Type 79s and they used them to humble the once mighty Team Lotus.
As well as being highly a recommendable treatment of some classic F1 cars, this book also contains some sobering lessons concerning management in a high-tech environment.
The Cronwood Press, 208 pages