The historic Lotus name will return to the F1 grid in 2010, after the FIA announced that the vacant 13th spot on the grid was given to a Malaysia-funded and very non-historic entry bearing it's name, with BMW Sauber given a place on the reserve list.
The entry, which will see the Lotus brand return to the F1 grid for the first time since the original team slid into liquidation in 1994, will be backed by confusingly-named Malaysian company 1Malaysia F1 Team Sdn Bhd, which is owned by Tony Fernandes, a man who also owns the Air Asia airline, making him something of a Malaysian Paul Stoddart.
The FIA statement also said that the team will have perennial failure Mike Gascoyne as their technical director, and that they will follow the other new-for-2010 teams in taking up a contract with Cosworth for a supply of spec-engines in 2010.
The new Lotus team will initially be based in Norfolk in the UK, near to the Lotus road car factory, in a facility previously used by the Bentley Le Mans programme. That base will be a temporary home while brand new facilities are built over at the Sepang International Circuit in Malaysia. Which we're sure is what Colin Chapman would have wanted.
The FIA also raised the possibility of a 14th team joining the party in 2010, after saying that the entry they received from BMW Sauber was "impressive". They lost out in the end to the fact that they were yet to find a buyer for the team that will see BMW leave it at the end of the season.
The FIA said that the BMW Sauber team were in "14th place" for 2010 should another grid slot become available, but also said that it would be "consulting urgently with the existing teams regarding the introduction of an appropriate rule change to expand the grid to 28 cars in time for the first Grand Prix in 2010."
To add a boost to their hopes, this afternoon the BMW Sauber team announced that they had found a new backer for the outfit.
The BMW company announced that the Qadbak Investments company has agreed to buy the Formula 1 team based in Hinwil that BMW currently runs.
"A strong investor has therefore been found for the Hinwil-based team," a BMW statement droned, "Qadbak's interest in the team will be represented by Lionel Fischer, a Swiss national. BMW wishes Qadbak and the Sauber Team every success for the 2010 season and beyond."
The team will now wait and see if an opportunity to race in 2010 presents itself.
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