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How the fastest Elise ever compares to 3 sportscars you know

The Lotus Elise had its 20th anniversary last year, and the British sports-car maker's belated celebration is the quickest production Elise ever around its test track. The new Elise Cup 250 can sprint to 60 miles per hour in 3.9 seconds and reach a top speed of 154 mph. It's essentially Lotus' answer to a Porsche Cayman GT4. The Elise Cup 250 replaces the Cup 220 in the model lineup, and Lotus plans to limit production to 200 units annually. The 1.8-liter supercharged four-cylinder now makes 243 horsepower and 184 pound-feet of torque, compared to 217 hp and 184 lb-ft from the predecessor. The company claims the Cup 250 laps its test track in 1:34, which is four seconds better than the 220. On paper, the Cup 250 could give a Cayman GT4 quite a fight. The Porsche's 385 hp wins on power, but it weighs significantly more at 2,955 pounds. Those differences translate to a slower 60 mph run of 4.2 seconds but a faster 183-mph top speed. We also think the upcoming Jaguar F-Type SVR could make for interesting competition around a very tight track. A recent leak suggests the new model has over 560 horsepower and a 200-mph top speed, so it would easily win on an open course. On a curvy circuit, the Lotus could be an intriguing challenger. Lotus Elise Cup weighs a scant 2,053 pounds in normal trim and 2,030 pounds with the optional Carbon Aero package, which includes carbon fiber parts for the front splitter, rear wing, rear diffuser and side-floor extensions. To save weight, Lotus fits the car with a lithium-ion battery, carbon fiber seats, and forged alloy wheels. The suspension and brakes carryover from the 220, including Bilstein dampers, Eibach springs, and AP Racing brakes. Lotus models often have a sparse interior, and that continues with the Cup 250. The options list includes usually common items like air conditioning and cruise control. A package even combines a radio, carpets, and sound deadening. Standard cars come with a red or black Alcantara interior, but leather is available. The Cup 250 goes on sale in April for 45,600 pounds ($65,170 at current rates), but it isn't available in North America. This forbidden fruit makes for an interesting comparison to other stripped-down models, though. For example, the Evora 400, which is for sale in the US, is slightly slower to 60 at 4.1 seconds but its 1:32 time around the Hethel test track is two seconds a lap quicker.

What has Lotus got in store for us in Geneva?

In its latest announcement, Lotus has reported a substantial increase in sales over the past nine months of this fiscal year to date. That's good news for the once troubled niche automaker, but the interesting part was hidden further down the release. After detailing the jump in sales by 54 percent worldwide, Lotus announced that it "is revealing an exciting new car at the important Geneva International Motor Show in early March 2015." While little in the way of details were confirmed, the company said that "the product will remain true to its core pillars of lightness, performance and driving purity by embodying all of them in a most desirable package." Sounds pretty Lotus-like to us, but just what form it will take remains to be seen. Given that the Malaysian-owned British automaker has scrapped all of its ambitious new projects, the overwhelming likelihood is that whatever it is preparing to reveal in Geneva will be based on one of its existing models: the Elise, Exige or Evora. The last we heard, Hethel was planning a revision to the Evora, convertible and even crossover versions of the same, as well as an even more hard-core version of the Exige to take the place of the extreme 2-Eleven track car. The announcement refers to the Elise S Cup that was the company's most recent reveal, but seems to indicate that the Geneva show car will be something different. 19 January 2015 Lotus sales up 54% world-wide for the first nine months of the financial year · 81% sales increase EU overall · 88% increase in UK · 143% increase in France · 139% increase in Germany · 29% up USA; 50% up Canada · 24% up Asia and Middle East · 130% sales increases in China; 125% in Japan · Lotus Motorsport shows 19% increase · 163 dealers, 25 more than nine months ago, 50 more in pipeline by the end of 2015. · Exciting reveal in Geneva Announcing that overall sales are up by 54% in the past nine months provides tangible proof that the forward strategy established by Lotus Cars is working. In volume terms, the increase of 551 cars over the previous year, to a total of 1,565, is an excellent result for the British sports car maker. Lotus has enlarged and strengthened its representation globally, with 25 new dealers enrolled across a number of territories in the past nine months, with another 50 new dealers joining Lotus by the end of 2015.

This is how ground effects work in a nutshell

There are two ways to generate downforce. One is with all manner of wings and spoilers on the surface of the vehicle. The other is with ground effects. One you can clearly see, the other remains something of a hidden mystery. Fortunately, the good folks at Lotus and Goodwood are here to dumb it down for us non-engineer types. It's called Bernoulli's Principle, named after Swiss physicist Daniel Bernoulli who literally wrote the book on the subject way back in the 1700s. Countless engineers have spent their careers focused on its study and application, but the crux of the matter is that, as the speed of air (or other "fluid") increases, pressure decreases. Play with the air's increasing speed and decreasing pressure just right and you can generate downforce underneath the body of a car without significantly increasing drag as you would with surface spoilers. For evidence of how Bernoulli's Principle applies in practical terms, just look at the last Ferrari to pack a turbocharged V8 in the middle and the latest one. The F40 had a giant wing on the back, where the 488 GTB has none. But because the 488 uses underbody aerodynamics (or "ground effects"), it generates significantly more downforce than the winged F40 ever could, and at lower speeds. Ferrari, however, was not the first outfit to harness the power of ground effects. Lotus did with the legendary 79 that Mario Andretti drove to the world championship back in 1978. That was the genius of Colin Chapman, and to explain how it all works in layman's terms, our friends over at Goodwood Road & Racing brought in Colin's son Clive Chapman, head of Classic Team Lotus, to put together the video above. Related Video: