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Lotus Sport Exige Records its First Win Review

September 2005
Filed under: LOTUS Car News | LOTUS Headlines
The one and only prototype Lotus Sport Exige, run by Proton R3 (Proton's Motorsports Division) and SuperGT team, Amprex Motorsports dominated the 12 hour Merdeka Millennium Endurance race (MME) at Sepang International Circuit in Malaysia on Saturday 27 August 2005.

Lotus Sport Exige wins at Merdeka Millennium Endurance race

The Lotus Sport Exige, driven by Tengku Djan Ley (Malaysia), Genji Hashimoto (Japan) and Tony Ricciardello (Australia) clinched both the overall and β€œClass O” wins, having secured pole position the previous day. Not only did the team win the race but also set the fastest lap, and a new record over 12 hours of 279 laps at an average of 2 minutes 22 seconds for each of the 5.542 km long laps.
The Lotus Sport Exige raced under incredibly tough conditions (with very high humidy and temperatures in the mid to high 30s Celcius with rain during the 5th hour) against a mixed GT sportscar and Touring Car field from Porsche, Honda, Nissan amongst others. Other Lotus cars (Elise and Exige) also competed, but all eyes were on the Lotus Sport Exige as it as it lined up on the starting grid for the first time.

Lotus Sport Exige is a direct motorsport derivative of the successful Lotus Exige developed by Lotus Sport, the performance division of Lotus Cars Ltd.

Power is provided by a 400 hp Swindon Racing Engines tuned GM 3 litre V6 racing engine and adhering to the key Lotus philosophy of performance through lightweight, the Lotus Sport Exige weighs in at just 850kg.

There are no plans as yet to build further examples of the Lotus Sport Exige but the base structure has been carefully designed to comply with key motorsport regulations around the world.

Chris Arnold, General Manager for Lotus Sport said: β€œThe winning result was a fantastic achievement for the Proton R3 Amprex team and of course Lotus Sport at Hethel, Norfolk UK. I am delighted that the Lotus Sport Exige won so comprehensively and under such tough conditions in its first endurance event!. Thank you to all the team and our partners who put a massive amount of work into the project!”

Results

Merdeka Millennium Endurance 2005

Overall Classification:

1. Tengku Djan Ley | Genji Hashimoto | Tony Ricciardello [Lotus Sport Exige] – 279 Laps

2. Hiroki Katoh | Eddie Liew | Farriz Fauzi [Honda Civic 2.0] – 278 Laps

3. Nicholas Thomas | Clive Bates | Joe Sevack [Porsche 996] – 269 Laps

4. Rueben Wong | Ng Eng Tiong | Jeff Wright [Honda Integra DC5] – 266 Laps

5. Desmond Soh | Apathorn Karnasuta | Piti Bhirombhakdi [Mitsubishi Evo 9] – 266 Laps

6. Firhat Mokhzani | Eric Teo | TJ Chin [Nissan Skyline R34] – 265 Laps

7. Patrick Ng | Khoo Beng Swee | Khoo Kay Hong [ Lotus 340R] – 260 Laps

8. Ryo Michigami | Kunimitsu Takahashi | Tommy Lee [Honda Civic] – 253 Laps

9. Tseu Chan Kee |Faisal Zelman Malik | Wira Dani Daim [Porsche GT3] – 253 Laps

10. Sharjihan Ghouse | Jackie Ng | Freddie Chen [Honda Integra] – 251 Laps

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