The Real Lotus Story

The recent Lotus soap opera has been pretty incredible. In a matter of less than half a year, parent company Proton sold its majority stake to DRB-Hicom, endangering the commitments and resources once promised to back Group Lotus' five-year plan to produce the five cars it unveiled at the 2010 Paris Motor Show, including the revival of the legendary Esprit.

Then, Group Lotus announced the termination of its title sponsorship of the Lotus-Renault F1 team, causing some serious rumors to surface. The word around the office is that Lotus will be going into administration, and Lotus CEO Dany Bahar is being placed on leave.

Yet despite the end of title sponsorship and mounting financial issues within the brand itself, more news revealed that Proton still holds a call option to purchase 10 percent of the Lotus F1 team from current team owner, Genii Capital.

In short, all the madness we're seeing unfold is starting to look like the tragic downfall of not just a storied British sports car marque, but threatens the equilibrium of the F1 race team as well. A failed attempt from Lotus to down play the media frenzy has only left car buffs and racing enthusiasts even more hopelessly confused.

However, there is still one great thing that I can take out of all this - it has caused myself to think about Colin Chapman and Lotus' past glory more than ever before. I've been searching on youtube for something that I could really sink my teeth into and this is far more than I ever expected I would find. It's a bit long, but if you have the time, why not?