| Senna Drives Lotus At Goodwood | ||
 |
||
|
(Thu 04 May 06) This will be the first time Bruno has driven the car, but he'll have some idea of what to expect, having driven a slightly later Lotus 98T at Interlagos two years ago in a tribute to his uncle. "It was pretty scary," he says now, "because it was a very powerful car and I had never driven the circuit before. I just took it easy and enjoyed the atmosphere of the crowd that day." Just to add to the emotion, the 97T - now owned by Classic Team Lotus - is the car in which Ayrton Senna scored his first-ever F1 victory in the 1985 Portuguese Grand Prix at Estoril. "To drive the car used by my uncle to win his first Grand Prix will be something truly special," says Bruno. "He considered the Estoril race to be his greatest ever drive, even more so than his famous victory in the rain at Donington at the 1993 European Grand Prix. It is a great honour for me to be able to experience driving the car." The 97T has a turbocharged 1.5-litre Renault engine, and its appearance at Goodwood is part of Renault's contribution to the event. Other cars and drivers involved include a Renault R25 F1 car (driven by Heikki Kovalainen and Giancarlo Fisichella), a Megane Trophy (Rene Arnoux), a 5 Maxi Turbo (Adam Keeler) and a 1907 Vanderbilt Cup car (Wolfgang Auge and Bill Spoerle). Renault Gallery Previous: Toyota's Mobility Initiative Next: Hybrid Battery Developments |
One of the most evocative sights at this year's Goodwood Festival of Speed will be that of Bruno Senna driving a Lotus 97T Formula 1 car. Senna is the nephew of multiple World Champion Ayrton Senna, and at 22 years of age he's making quite an impression on the sport himself, being the current leader of the British Formula 3 Championship (which Ayrton won many years ago after a ferocious year-long battle with Martin Brundle).
