Lotus 25

---

---

Season: 1962,1963,1964,1965,1966,1967   Drive: Rear   Engine placement: Rear   Number of wheels: 4

---

Lotus founder Colin Chapman's status in the F1 community, even to this day, is that of a legendary innovator. Though there are many F1 chassis, and indeed road cars that bear the Lotus name, there are a few chassis and innovations that have contributed heavily to the Chapman legend. Among these is the Lotus 25, first raced in 1962 by the Lotus works team, but had an extended racing career in the hands of privateers until 1967.

The Lotus 25 was the first Formula One car to use a monocoque chassis, in this case, a box-sectioned tub made from L72 Aluminium alloy rather than utilising the steel tubular spaceframe chassis used by all the other constructors on the grid. The subsequent huge increase in torsional rigidity, along with a decrease in overall weight due to the lower density of aluminium over steel, allowed Lotus to run softer suspension setups, aiding competitiveness especially in slower corners. Rather famously, the initial sketches of the Lotus 25 were drawn on a restaurant napkin by Chapman himself, although he himself was not totally convinced by the design, resulting in Lotus continuing development, manufacture, and sale of the tubular space frame chassis Lotus 24 to their customers. Ironically, Chapman had refused the advances of another race car designer, Tom Killeen, who had already designed a monocoque (non F1) race car known as the K1. However, before long, Formula 1 would embrace monocoque technology. As a result of the monocoque construction, the trend for drivers to sit in a reclining fashion within the chassis was also born with the Lotus 25.

Although the Lotus 25 was extremely competitive at debut, it failed to win the 1962 championship mainly due to unreliability, a fact highlighted by the fact that the car, in the hands of Jim Clark, qualified fastest in six of the nine races of the 1962 season, set the fastest lap at five races that season, and scored 27 out of 30 points for Clark from three wins that season. Rather famously, Clark lost the 1962 championship due to an oil leak 25 laps from home caused by a bolt coming loose from the distributor housing in the Lotus 25's Climax V8 engine. The car was to show its true competitiveness in the next season, however, with Clark gaining maximum points given that the championship was decided on the best six races from ten.

Through its racing career, several notable drivers other than Clark piloted the Lotus 25, either for Team Lotus or as customers. These included Jack Brabham, Chris Amon and Piers Courage. Various different types of engine were used in the Lotus 25 chassis - made by both Climax and BRM.

Statistics

---

Statistic	#	Percentage	First	Last
Number of Grand Prix	106	100%	1962	1967
Number of starts	102	96.23%	1962	1967
Number of finishes	54	50.94%	1962	1967
Number of finishes on podium	18	16.98%	1962	1965
Number of finishes in points	29	27.36%	1962	1966
Number of retirements	47	44.34%	1962	1967
Number of wins	14	13.21%	1962	1965
Number of pole positions	18	16.98%	1962	1965
Number of fastest laps	15	14.15%	1962	1965
Number of doubles (pole position & win)	9	8.49%	1962	1965
Number of triples (pole position, win & fastest lap)	7	6.60%	1962	1965

Seasons:	6 (1962, 1963, 1964, 1965, 1966, 1967)
Leading:	24 times during 1029 laps in 22 Grand Prix with a total of 5304.346 Km
Points:	146 (Average per start: 1.43)
	Points per season - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 30 54 47 11 4 0 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1967
Team:	Team Lotus (1962), Team Lotus (1963), Brabham Racing Organisation (1963), Reg Parnell Racing (1964), Team Lotus (1964), Reg Parnell Racing (1965), Team Lotus (1965), Reg Parnell Racing Ltd (1966), Team Lotus (1966), Reg Parnell Racing Ltd (1967)
Driver:	Jim Clark (16, 1962), Jim Clark (1, 1962), Trevor Taylor (9, 1962), Jim Clark (4, 1962), Jim Clark (20, 1962), Trevor Taylor (14, 1962), Jim Clark (8, 1962), Trevor Taylor (22, 1962), Jim Clark (18, 1962), Jim Clark (12, 1962), Jim Clark (5, 1962), Trevor Taylor (2, 1962), Trevor Taylor (2, 1963), Trevor Taylor (9, 1963), Jim Clark (1, 1963), Jim Clark (8, 1963), Trevor Taylor (5, 1963), Jim Clark (3, 1963), Trevor Taylor (20, 1963), Jim Clark (9, 1963), Trevor Taylor (10, 1963), Mike Spence (6, 1963), Trevor Taylor (4, 1963), Peter Arundell (22, 1963), Jack Brabham (3, 1963), Jim Clark (18, 1963), Trevor Taylor (8, 1963), Pedro Rodriguez (10, 1963), Jim Clark (6, 1963), Jim Clark (4, 1963), Jim Clark (8, 1964), Mike Hailwood (17, 1964), Mike Hailwood (36, 1964), Mike Hailwood (15, 1964), Peter Arundell (24, 1964), Chris Amon (14, 1964), Mike Spence (2, 1964), Peter Arundell (11, 1964), Mike Hailwood (18, 1964), Chris Amon (10, 1964), Peter Arundell (4, 1964), Chris Amon (17, 1964), Chris Amon (34, 1964), Chris Amon (15, 1964), Jim Clark (23, 1964), Mike Hailwood (12, 1964), Jim Clark (2, 1964), Mike Spence (1, 1964), Peter Revson (36, 1964), Jim Clark (18, 1964), Mike Hailwood (40, 1964), Chris Amon (16, 1964), Chris Amon (27, 1964), Mike Hailwood (14, 1964), Gerhard Mitter (23, 1964), Jim Clark (12, 1964), Peter Arundell (20, 1964), Jim Clark (1, 1964), Innes Ireland (23, 1965), Richard Attwood (21, 1965), Jim Clark (6, 1965), Moises Solana (18, 1965), Richard Attwood (34, 1965), Richard Attwood (15, 1965), Chris Amon (24, 1965), Richard Attwood (22, 1965), Richard Attwood (20, 1965), Richard Attwood (40, 1965), Mike Hailwood (16, 1965), Gerhard Mitter (3, 1965), Richard Attwood (23, 1965), Innes Ireland (22, 1965), Mike Spence (8, 1965), Chris Amon (19, 1965), Innes Ireland (38, 1965), Tony Maggs (15, 1965), Giacomo Russo (28, 1965), Phill Hill (20, 1966), Mike Spence (16, 1966), Mike Spence (42, 1966), Mike Spence (18, 1966), Mike Spence (15, 1966), Mike Spence (32, 1966), Mike Spence (17, 1966), Mike Spence (6, 1966), Chris Irwin (18, 1967), Piers Courage (16, 1967)
Engine:	Climax 1.5 V8 (1962), Climax 1.5 V8 (1963), BRM 1.5 V8 (1964), Climax 1.5 V8 (1964), BRM 1.5 V8 (1965), Climax 1.5 V8 (1965), BRM 1.9 V8 (1966), Climax 1.5 V8 (1966), BRM 1.5 V8 (1967), BRM 2.0 V8 (1967)

Created by: system last modification: Thursday 14 of July, 2005 [13:51:15 UTC] by Griffin