![\"Gerard-Lopez-1\"](\"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/gallery\/f1-2013-rif-images\/f1-2013-persons\/Gerard-Lopez-1.jpg\")
When the FIA issued the official 2014 entry list recently, Lotus’ place was marked with a conspicuous asterisk, fuelling rumours of financial doom.<\/p>\nLotus owner Gerard Lopez has moved to allay fears the Enstone based team is on the verge of collapse.<\/p>\n
When the FIA issued the official 2014 entry list recently, Lotus’ place was marked with a conspicuous asterisk, fuelling rumours of financial doom.<\/p>\n
“We just had the wrong team name on the list, namely the one of two years ago,” Lopez told Germany’s Auto Motor und Sport on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
“I can assure you — everything is still the same.”<\/p>\n
Despite the reassurance, however, many wonder if the now-terminally delayed ‘Quantum’ buy-in has derailed Lotus, who have turned to the lucratively-backed Venezuelan Pastor Maldonado to replace unpaid Finn Kimi Raikkonen.<\/p>\n
Lopez insists Raikkonen has now been “partly paid”.\u00a0 “He will get the rest,” he added.<\/p>\n
But Lotus is also sitting out the forthcoming Jerez test, where every other team is expected to put the newly V6-powered single seaters through their paces for the first time.<\/p>\n
Like the entry list, Lotus’ absence will be conspicuous.<\/p>\n
“We are very satisfied with the development of our car,” Lopez said, “which will perhaps look a bit different from the others.<\/p>\n
“We believe it is better to use the next few weeks in the wind tunnel, which will give us more than one test on the track would.”<\/p>\n
He insists that missing Jerez will not give Lotus’ rivals a head-start when it comes to understanding the new turbo ‘power unit’.<\/p>\n
“There is also Red Bull, Toro Rosso and Caterham testing (the Renault engine), and the findings will also benefit us,” said Lopez.<\/p>\n
“Any changes Renault makes before the Bahrain test will also be in our car,” he explained.<\/p>\n
“The first real test is in Bahrain,” said Lopez.\u00a0 “Before that, we can find more laptime in the factory.”<\/p>\n
But, actually, Lotus or Renault never officially announced a new deal for 2014.\u00a0 Does the team even have an engine for 2014?<\/p>\n
“We have the Renault engine,” Lopez insisted, “but Lotus is not just a customer of Renault.\u00a0 Our engineers for example have helped develop the KERS.<\/p>\n
“So we have tried to agree that it is more than just an engine deal, which has delayed the negotiations somewhat.”<\/p>\n
But now terminally delayed, Lopez admitted, is the Quantum deal.<\/p>\n
“The money never arrived,” he said, “so we cancelled it.\u00a0 For 2014, our budget is complete with our new sponsor PDVSA.”<\/p>\n
Finally, Lopez played down reports of a link with the Italian marque De Tomaso.<\/p>\n
“There is currently nothing to it,” he said, but he did admit that he is looking into developing a carbon sports car, and “De Tomaso is an option”.<\/p>\n
“But this has nothing to do with formula one,” added Lopez.<\/p>\n
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