LOTUS 95T
BEST RESULT 2ND 1984 DETROIT GP POLES 2 SUPERTIME POSITION 3RD DESIGNER GERARD DUCAROUGE RENAULT RE50 BEST RESULT 2ND 1984 BELGIAN, FRENCH AND BRITISH GPS POLES 1 SUPERTIME POSITION 4TH DESIGNER MICHAEL TETU AND BERNARD DUDOT
THESE TWO 1984 MACHINES BELONG TOGETHER.
Not only did they achieve similar performance, but they were powered by the same turbocharged Renault EF4 engine and both probably deserved to be winners.
The 95T, driven by Nigel Mansell and Elio de Angelis, was more reliable, helping to explain why Lotus finished third in the constructors’ table, two spots ahead of Renault. Mansell famously crashed out in the wet in Monaco, shortly after taking the lead, and Lotus even locked out the front row in Dallas. But the Renault came closer to winning a GP.
“I think I could have won three or four races in that car,” reckons Derek Warwick, who picks out the RE50 as one of the three best cars of his long career. “Same for [team-mate] Patrick Tambay – we just had too many mechanicals.”
Warwick was only running at the end of four of the 16 races and each time he was on the podium, underlining the car’s pace. He also nearly won the season opener in Brazil, retiring from the lead in the closing stages thanks to suspension failure, probably the legacy of a clash with Niki Lauda’s Mclaren.
Tambay scored a pole, but the poor reliability record stifled Renault and the car’s consumption was also an issue in an era of fuel restrictions.
And yet Warwick remains a fan of the RE50: “When I first drove it out of the pitlane I thought,
‘Wow, what is this?’ It just felt right, it felt smooth, and we were instantly quick. It was a good engine with good power right the way through the range, and the chassis was very responsive to change. We knew we had the chance to win races.”
“It felt right. We knew we had the chance to win races”