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Lotus hops into Extreme E with Jenson Button ahead of first race weekend

The Extreme E racing series is filling out with a host of interesting names, and Lotus is the latest manufacturer to join the fray. Lotus is hopping in as technical partner to the Jenson Button Extreme E team, making it quite the British powerhouse. A single photo of the rally vehicle is above with a simple JBXE and Lotus livery. Seeing Lotus hop into electric racing makes sense given that it will be pushing the Evija hypercar out the door soon. The company says it will be leveraging the experience it gained in development of that car to help it succeed on the motorsports side. “We are on the cusp of an exciting new era of electrified motorsport, and weÂ’re delighted to support the JBXE team as Technical Partner,” says Matt Windle, managing director of Lotus Cars. “The complex technicalities of EV racing present a fascinating challenge, and using our learnings from more than a decade of electrifying sports cars – most recently with the Lotus Evija hypercar – we can bring valuable knowledge to the team.” Jenson Button is acting as both the team owner and driver of the car in the Extreme E series. Other notable car companies hopping into the series include GMC (a Hummer partnership), Fisker, Hispano Suiza and Cupra. Other racing outfits are also hopping on without the support of major car manufacturers. The field has just nine teams right now, but the slow trickle continues with promising entries. This latest development with Lotus and Jenson Button is just another feather in the seriesÂ’ cap. "Lotus is a great British brand that is inextricably linked to motorsport, so we are delighted to welcome Lotus Engineering to JBXE,” Button says. “Extreme E is a unique and exciting formula, full of 'world firsts' and challenges, and to announce that a brand such as Lotus Engineering is coming on this journey with us is a proud moment for myself and the team. We are very excited about our new technical partnership and canÂ’t wait to show what we can do in the first race this weekend.” That first race — termed the “Desert X Prix” — will take place in Saudi Arabia this weekend. ItÂ’s airing on Fox Sports in the U.S. The second race is nearly two months after this upcoming one and will take place in Senegal.

Lotus C-01 motorcycle rumored to get 200-hp V-twin engine

Back in June, Lotus announced it was getting into the motorcycle business. Or, we should say, Kodewa and the Holzer Group are getting into the motorcycle business, and have acquired the rights to use the Lotus name. One way or another, we're now receiving word on some of the specs we can expect from the prototype dubbed C-01.
The Lotus motorcycle is being designed by Daniel Simon, the automotive futurist who has penned, among other things, the light-cycles for Tron: Legacy and the livery on the LMP2 racer Kodewa also fields under the Lotus name. So you know it's going to look pretty awesome, but what will make it go?
According to Visor Down, the C-01 is being tested with a V-twin engine sourced from an undisclosed supplier that produces 170 horsepower in stock trim but has been tuned to produce nearly 200 hp in Lotus trim. A pair of prototypes - one with carbon-fiber bodywork and one without - have already undergone several thousand kilometers of testing, and are said to be handling "very well."

Lotus Emira First Edition starts at $85,900

Last October, Lotus priced the Emira V6 First Edition at $93,900 before destination and taxes. That coupe comes with a Toyota-sourced 3.5-liter supercharged six-cylinder making 400 horsepower and 310 pound-feet of torque when fitted with a six-speed manual gearbox, or 317 lb-ft when fitted with a six-speed automatic. Now, the automaker's finally put numbers to the Emira First Edition with the AMG-sourced four-cylinder; it makes 360 hp and 310 lb-ft and costs $85,900 before incidentals. The MSRP is $8,000 less than the forerunner, but $3,000 more than the standard series Emira V6. Copying the template of the Emira V6 First Edition, the four-pot throws in a bunch of extra gear at no cost. The Lower Black Pack, Drivers Pack, Design Pack, and Convenience Pack are included. Twenty-inch diamond-cut two-tone wheels are standard, but silver or gloss black finishes are no-cost options, as are brake calipers in either black, red, silver, or yellow. All the mod-cons in the Emira V6 are here in the Emira, from the 12.3-inch digital gauge cluster and 10.25-inch infotainment screen to the climate control, navigation, and 340-watt KEF audio. Six exterior colors include Dark Verdant, Hethel Yellow, Magma Red, Nimbus Grey, Seneca Blue, and Shadow Grey. The interior offers seven hues, four in various leather shades and three in Alcantara with contrasting stitching. The meat of the matter is that inline-four bought from Germany. Lotus said the AMG M139 motor's been tuned at Hethel for the Emira, its hardware and software tweaked for placement in the middle of the vehicle and to provide a proper Lotus experience. The exhaust is also a Lotus design. It's mated to an eight-speed dual-clutch transmission that's also seen English revision for work in a rear-wheel-drive sports car.  The only way to tell the Emira apart from the Emira V6 would be to get close enough examine the engine cover or read the badge on the C-Pillar. Perhaps handling or exhaust tuning will put them farther apart, but the initial performance specs don't. The Emira is 0.1 second slower to 60 miles per hour than the Emira V6, and maxes out 4 mph short of the Emira V6's 180-mph top speed. That's not a lot of daylight for an $8,000 price difference. The configurator is up now, so shoppers can make up their own minds.