The latest Lotus Elise and Exige parts and services and motorsport plans from Hangar 111 Lotus Performance

A great result for James Little, Andrew Bentley, and the Hangar 111 Racing team at Donington Park today – first place for the Elise Cup R in Lotus Cup UK!

With a sudden downpour on the grid giving a wet start to the race, James drove brilliantly (on dry tyres!), despite a spin which dropped him a couple of positions. At the perfectly timed mandatory pit stop around half distance, James had driven back up into 3rd place, when the driver change put Andrew into the car. Andrew then went about setting some impressive lap times as the track dried, to catch and pass the leader just a few laps from the chequered flag.

A great team performance got us the top step of the podium – congratulations to James and Andrew on an excellent drive in tricky conditions, with the Cup R delivering some seriously impressive lap times in all conditions.

Our favourite JRZ single adjustable dampers were recently tested back-to-back with a rival product, achieving 0.5 second faster lap time around Snetterton 300.  Road performance is equally impressive with much improved ride and handling quality, backed up with great durability.

Check out our online store for latest pricing and availability.

Today we were asked by a customer to collect a car that has been left parked up for a long time.  We knew it was an Esprit, but weren’t entirely sure what we were going to find…

Turned out to be an S3 Turbo Esprit HC, that has stood in a garage for about 10 years after the owner became unable to run it.  The car is totally original, with just 48,000 miles on the clock, and big pile of paperwork to back it up.

After some cajoling, we got it out into the daylight for the first time in a long while.  The interior is complete, original, and in great condition – indicative of a car that was once loved and well looked after.

It’s now back at the workshop, had the dust washed off it, and is ready to be gently brought back to life.  Lots of care will be taken to inspect everything and work out what needs to be replaced.  Hopefully the engine will turn over, but we’ll be checking it all carefully by hand first.

If you’re interested in a genuine all-original project car, that needs some TLC to be brought back to life, please drop us a line and we can put you in touch with the owner.

Today we had our first track test session of the 2015 season.  A productive day was had in the Snetterton sunshine, with our ‘new’ Lotus Elise Cup R race car, and driver James Little. It was good to be getting back into the swing of racing – it feels like a while since our last outing, time flies!

KTM has revealed an exciting preview of the all-new KTM X-Bow GTR GT4 race car.

(Image © KTM 2014)

The GTR is a joint project between KTM and Reiter Engineering, with Austrian design studio Kiska responsible for the overall visual design.

The name and the price have now been confirmed: The KTM X-BOW GTR will be available from April at € 139,000.

The first roll-out of the new vehicle is set for February. March will see the commencement of performance testing, and in spring the GT4 racing car will be available for the numerous customer teams that have expressed an interest.

Now that the various development processes are completed and most of the production processes have begun for the many special parts, Reiter Engineering owner Hans Reiter is now able to communicate the price of the KTM X-BOW GTR. “At € 139,000 we have managed to offer
an attractive price for the most modern and safe GT4 racing car on the market. The GTR features the most advanced racing technology, which is normally only the case in higher categories. And in matters of safety, the monocoque technology offers the most unique protection ever in this class up to this point in time. In addition, thanks to the special construction of our latest racing car, the ‘running costs’ are kept within encouraging limits.”

The creation of the GTR is another important next-step in the ongoing evolution of the X-Bow. KTM launched the X-Bow in 2008, and the X-Bow GT, which features a wrap-around windshield, in 2013. The addition of a third iteration of the X-Bow, one that is fully covered and “Ready To Race” is the next logical step in the vehicles development.

We have a special visitor to the workshop this week – one of the last 6 Esprit to roll off the production line.

As you can imagine, it has all the updated bits that were fitted to the final run cars, but this car also has a number of modifications.  One of the most notable of which is the de-cat, which gives the flat-plane crank V8 a true supercar soundtrack!

It’s always interesting to be able to see and work on some of these special cars.