New Lotus debuts as second test starts in Bahrain

Lotus’s 2014 car, the Renault-powered E22, finally made its official debut on Wednesday morning as the second pre-season test of the year got underway, this time in the rather warmer climes of Bahrain.

With Lotus having chosen to skip last month’s opening Spanish session to focus on factory development work, their new machine, which features a radical split-nose design, rolled out at Sakhir with Romain Grosjean at the wheel.

Grosjean will complete the opening two days of the four-day session, before handing over to new team mate Pastor Maldonado, who arrived from Williams over the off season to replace Kimi Raikkonen, now at Ferrari.

Lotus completed a successful shakedown of the E22 at Jerez last week, reportedly experiencing few if any of the power unit problems that plagued the other Renault teams at the first pre-season test.