1st or 80th?

Brogan

Legend
Staff Member
In the unlikely event that Lotus win a race this season (sorry c_a_t), will it be the first win for Lotus F1 Racing or the 80th win for Team Lotus?

This is an interesting situation because, to quote GM "Tony Fernandes thinks the team's next win will be their 80th, rather than their first. The Entrant now is Lotus F1 Racing, rather than Team Lotus. They are owned by the Malaysians, though, who also own Lotus Cars, and they have the blessing of Clive Chapman."

So which will it be?
There needs to be consensus on this point as it affect all F1 databases with regards to points, wins, etc.
Currently I think most people consider it to be the same team but is this a valid assumption?

There is an equally confusing situation when it comes to BMW Sauber.
Again, to quote GM, "BMW Sauber is tricky because the ownership has gone back to Peter Sauber, but they've had to keep the BMW in the name for purely technical reasons to avoid FIA penalties. Since the Entrant and Constructor are still BMW Sauber, I suppose we should credit them with the results, but that is giving BMW credit for something that's nothing to do with them. I can't think of a comparable example from the past."

So how do we treat BMW Sauber?
Do any results go to Sauber and are added to the original Sauber from 1993 to 2005?
Or are they added to BMW Sauber's records from 2006 to 2009?

Mercedes is more clear cut...possibly.
Brawn were a completely different team to Honda so although the "same" team has changed hands 3 times in 3 seasons, the results will be allocated to Honda in 2008, Brawn in 2009 and Mercedes in 2010, adding to the original team Mercedes results from 1954 to 1955 as ownership of the team is the same.

Dallara are the official named constructor for Campos, so should their results should be added to the Dallara-Scuderia Italia results from 1988 to 1993? Presumably yes? Or do we treat Campos as an entirely new team?

Thoughts and comments anyone?
 
Dallara - If Dallara/Scuderia Italia are separate from Scuderia Italia with other constructors, then stick Campos with Dallara.

Mercedes goes on the end of 1955.

And Lotus goes on the end of 1994 imo.

Sauber, no idea!
 
In the old days when March used to sell an F1 car to anyone with 10 bob spare did the result count towards March or the entrant? Tyrrell used a March chassis but I believe the results go against the Tyrrell team (please correct me if I am wrong).

For me Dallara/Campos is a new team and results should be given to said new team. There is some lineage between Team Lotus and the new team so I can accept adding these on to the previous history (ain't that big of me LOL )

BMW Sauber is a difficult one as the chassis is a BMW funded development (as was the Brawn chassis by Honda) so should credit be given to the company who stumped up the cash but Sauber have made all of BMW's F1 chassis so should all BMW's results be tagged onto Sauber? Realistically, the winning car last year was a Honda Mercedes entered by Brawn GP but I don't suppose anyone is going to rewrite the record books.
 
Tough pickle indeed.

For Sauber, I would have treated Sauber (original), BMW Sauber (buy out) and BMW Sauber (Peter Part 2) as one in the same team. BMW may have purchased Sauber but they went so far as to keep the Sauber name and therefore change of ownership does not mean in this case new team IMHO.

For Dallara there is already several precedents. As FB pointed out about March and there car being run by several teams also there is Lola. The Lola ran as Team Haas in the 80's, Built the chassis for the first Hill F1 cars, built the chassis for the 1993 Scurderia Italia (thats you precedent right there) and also ran under there own name (don't we all remember the Lola Mastercard Tank of 1997). So Campos/Dallara is a new team which should have new stats.

Merc should continue on from their 1955 stats. Much in the same way that Honda (for what little they scored) added on to their 1960's stats.

Lotus, :thinking: I genuinely don't know. My heart wants to say it's win number 80 but my head says it should be win number 1. (like that's going to happen any time soon any way). I think you'll have to go with the majority of the press and call it number 80. Even such luminaries as Autosport have quoted that figure in it's pages. The current team own the rights to Team Lotus (Mike Gascgoyne purchased them from Litespeed who had purchased them from David Hunt, after their attempt to re-launch the name failed) but for what ever reason chose not to file the entry under that name. As much as I am so glad to see the name Lotus return and have argued quite pasionatly and (I apologise) if a little forcefully that it is a legitimate use of the name I am not so sure where it stands with the history. So in conclusion I'm going to have to fence sit on that one and go with the majority of the motorsport press and say win 80.
 
This one is a difficult call. Although there is a link to the Lotus of the past, it is tenuous at best.

To me, Lotus is one of those glorious names from the past that is inextricably tied to one person-in this case, that would be Colin Chapman. In my view, Team Lotus ceased to exist following his untimely passing. I hold the same view for many of the storied teams from the past-Tyrrell (the buyers of which showed considerable class by rightly re-naming the team), Cobra (Carroll Shelby), Eagle (Dan Gurney), and Chaparral (Jim Hall). These teams were (and are) strictly the visions of one person, and when that person leaves the scene, IMO the team leaves with them. I was less determined with Brabham (surprising, since I am Australian), since Black Jack wasn't as central to the team as the aforementioned. However, even in that case, I would only consider a resurrection of the name to be valid if the team were brought back by one of the Brabham sons, either David or Geoff. I also have never been at peace with the continuation of the McLaren name after RD took over. I do make allowances in this case because the team never ceased to operate, and can, therefore be seen as an evolution of the original. That is not the case with Lotus.

When the inevitible happens and Frank Williams and Roger Penske retire from racing, I don't think that their team names should continue either.

As I said in another post, if I were to buy the rights to the name British Racing Motors, I don't believe that making that purchase would confer their storied past upon me. Nor would it mean that anything I do subsequently with a team with that name should be considered part of the history of the original team.

So to me, if Lotus does get a win, to me it will be win #1.

I'll get off my soapbox now :goodday:
 
I find myself in sympathy with a lot of the points of view - even the ones that seem to contradict each other.

If we separate out "Constructor" and "Team" (or entrant) I'd say:

Lotus: same Constructor, same Team as 1959-94
Mercedes: same Constructor, same Team as 1954-55
Dallara: same Constructor, different Team as 1988-92
BMW Sauber: same Constructor, same Team as 2006-09

But it's just for the database - we'll all still have our "feelings"! I understand from Bro that it can be changed later on relatively easily.
 
I would really like for someone in the media to get Mario Andretti's thoughts on Lotus. He drove for Colin Chapman for six years and won a WDC for Lotus. I would be willing to go along with his opinion, and I have no idea which side of the arguement he would come down on.

Another question- should Stefan GP be referred to as Toyota, as it is purely Toyota's car, engine and essentially entire team.
 
Can I just clarify if 1st or 80th is referring to where we think Lotus will finish in the WDC this season?


On another note, I think we should be counting any future victories (whenever they may occur) as their first, since only the name is the same. There's no direct continuation from the previous incarnation of the team.
 
cider_and_toast said:
Then what about Mercedes then Jez? (Or Honda and Renault for that matter?)

As far as I am concerned, Mercedes can count their wins back to when the team were first formed (i.e. not back to the Mercedes teams in the 40's or 50's). In other words, they should be allowed to count back wins from Brawn and Honda, etc, as the team was in existance throughout this time, albeit with different names.

If a team stops production and ceases to exist, then it's tally of wins should end at that point.

Just my opinion, but I don't really see how else to do it.
 
Just to follow up on this, the BMW Sauber chassis is denoted as C29 which follows the original Sauber naming convention so I guess the team considers itself to be a continuation of Sauber rather than BMW or BMW Sauber?

Similarly Lotus have the T127 and Mercedes the MGP W01.

Interestingly, Wikipedia has them as this:

Notice there is no link from the new Lotus to the old Lotus.
 

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It's an interesting one. Perhaps it's down to the fact that there is a direct continuation through those teams on the chart and a 16 year gap between Team Lotus and Lotus F1 Racing.

Renault muddy the waters on that chart even further because their results have been added together despite the fact that the original Renault team stopped competeing in 1985 and the new Renault team purchased Beneton in 02.

Also Honda's results what little there were, have been added on to Honda's results from the 60's.

I guess it just depends on the point of view of the Author.
 
This also from Wikipedia:

This article is about the Formula One team which started competing in 2010. For the 1954-1994 motorsport team, see Team Lotus.

Lotus Racing, also referred to by the company name 1Malaysia F1 Team by the Malaysian media and parliament, is a Formula One team granted entry to the 2010 Formula One season.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lotus_Racing

So what I've done is the following:

Mercedes - same team as Mercedes 1954-55
BMW Sauber - same team as Sauber 1993-05
Lotus - new team
Hispania (Campos) - new team

That ties in with Wiki.
I'll check the F1 site once the season has started and see how they classify them.
The DB can always be updated in the future if necessary.
 
Seems fair enough dosn't it.

New Lotus is still "Lotus" (loads of links with the company on various levels)

New Lotus acknowledge the debt owed to Team Lotus and are keen to preserve some sort of links and the history of the name.

New Lotus is however NOT a direct continuation of Team Lotus 1958-1994.

Everyone's a winner (maybe)
 
How are you going to name the two Loti?

Lotus (1958) and Lotus (2010) is my suggestion?

Or Lotus and Team Malaysia Lotus

Or Lotus (GB) and Lotus (My).
 
Slightly

But did you know it's in the FIA rulebook that the name of the team must contain the name of the Chassis. Hence Lotus F1 Racing and not 1Malaysia Racing otherwise the Chassis would have to be called the 1Malaysia T127.

On that note though, I'm wondering if Campos will be called Campos Dallara. Mind you, they're not going to be called anything if they don't magic up an F1 team by next Friday.

:D
 
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