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[/media-credit]Ft. Worth. TX (Saturday, June 09, 2012) – After strong practice and qualifying runs, Lotus HVM Racing suffers another setback at the Firestone 550 at Texas Motor Speedway. The team came to Texas full of hopes with an updated exhaust system that offered a promise of more speed and competitiveness. Unfortunately, due to a sudden fuel pressure issue, the #78 Nuclear Clean Air Energy car was unable to start the race.
De Silvestro was not happy to be sidelined without turning a single lap. “We have one update finally and then something like this happens, which is annoying” she said. “But that’s kind of how the whole season has been going with our program. The guys are working their butts off and we’re trying to make things happen, but we just don’t have the pieces all put together right now.”
The team, which has struggled all season, was hoping that the pieces were going to start falling into place beginning with the updates brought for this race. Unfortunately, things did not turn out that way.
Keith Wiggins, team owner, was not pleased. “I’d say that disappointing is an understatement,” he said; “devastating is more accurate. I don’t think we’ve ever not started a race before. But, we had a problem with the engine; we couldn’t get fuel pressure, so we just have to lick our wounds and move on.”
Team manager, Shane Seneviratne was equally unhappy with the day’s turn of events. “I feel bad for the team,” he said. “We had a fuel pressure problem that took us out of the race. We didn’t even get to do a single lap. We were running well in practice and qualifying; we were closing the gap. Now we just have to look forward to Milwaukee.”
Lotus HVM Racing and the IZOD IndyCar Series next head to the legendary Milwaukee Mile for a second consecutive Saturday race. The Milwaukee IndyFest airs on ABC, Saturday, June 16 at 1:00 p.m. Eastern.
About Lotus HVM Racing
HVM Racing was founded by Keith Wiggins and is based in Indianapolis, Indiana. The 2012 season marks its eleventh year of competition since forming in 2001. Since its inception, HVM Racing has earned six victories, two pole positions, 22 podiums, 40 top-five finishes and 97 top-tens. The team also earned “Indianapolis 500 Rookie of the Year” honors with current driver Simona De Silvestro in 2010. HVM finished fourth and third, respectively, in the Champ Car World Series in 2006 and 2007, and earned drivers Mario Dominguez and Robert Doornbos Rookie of the Year honors in 2002 and 2007, respectively. Lotus HVM Racing can be found online at www.hvmracing.com. Follow the team on twitter at www.twitter.com/HVMRacing and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/HVMRacing.
About Lotus
Group Lotus plc, is based in Norfolk, UK, and has three operating divisions: Lotus Cars, Lotus Engineering and LotusRacing.
Lotus Racing (formerly Lotus Motorsport) operates the motorsports activities of Lotus and includes the strategy to return the Lotus name to a great number of series including endurance racing with GT2, GT4 and LMP2, single seater racing with GP2, GP3 and IndyCar. Lotus also competes in Formula 1 with the Lotus F1 Team,racing in the iconic Black and Gold livery.
About Entergy
Entergy is the second largest owner and operator of U.S. nuclear energy plants. They operate or provide management services to 12 reactors at 10 sites. Entergy Corporation is an integrated energy company engaged primarily in electric power production and retail distribution operations. Entergy owns and operates power plants with approximately 30,000 megawatts of electric generating capacity and delivers electricity to 2.7 million utility customers in Arkansas , Louisiana , Mississippi and Texas . Entergy has annual revenues of more than $11 billion and more than 15,000 employees. For more information: www.entergy-nuclear.com and www.NuclearCleanAirEnergy.com; on Twitter at @NuclearCleanAir, and on facebook at www.facebook.com/NuclearCleanAirEnergy.
