Worlds only Elise GT1 in maidstone...

Worlds only Elise GT1 in maidstone...

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Rochester BMW

Original Poster:

3,313 posts

213 months

Tuesday 8th May 2007
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Just came back from looking at buying an Elise at Lipscomb Lotus in Maidstone and to my surprise there was a Black Elise GT1 on a trailer behind their dealership.

After chatting to the salesman, its apparently the ONLY GT1 in existance and will be staying in their showroom for a while...

Unfortunatly I didn't have my camera on me but it looked amazing! Well worth the trip!

kevin ritson

3,423 posts

234 months

Tuesday 8th May 2007
quotequote all
Seen it a couple of times, lovely car - there was a feature on it in Evo a couple of years ago. The owner had it resprayed the charcoal grey colour from blue but because of the carbon fibre bodywork most of this had been absorbed into the weave! So quite a job...

There is another one in existence IIRC but it's a converted race car.

monkey boy 1

2,063 posts

238 months

Tuesday 8th May 2007
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I think Lotus made Seven GT1 cars , but how many road versions exist, I don't know at present.

Originally the type 115 road had a version of the 3.5 litre V8 Esprit engine, The race version though, after some rule changes about Turbo engines, was fitted with a 6.0 litre DOHC V8 derived from the LT5 engine that Lotus designed for the Corvette ZR-1. The car had no success in the FIA GT Championship and failed to finish the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1997, its only year of competition.

Here's one of them that was up for sale a while back on Ebay.. of all places


bogie

16,614 posts

279 months

Tuesday 8th May 2007
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they meant the only road-going GT1 ...seen that car a couple of times at shows in the UK...an awesome bit of kit

Rochester BMW

Original Poster:

3,313 posts

213 months

Tuesday 8th May 2007
quotequote all
kevin ritson said:
Seen it a couple of times, lovely car - there was a feature on it in Evo a couple of years ago. The owner had it resprayed the charcoal grey colour from blue but because of the carbon fibre bodywork most of this had been absorbed into the weave! So quite a job...

There is another one in existence IIRC but it's a converted race car.


Thats right it was in a charcoal grey colour. Car in question had number plates the lot ready for road use, by memory I think it was a P or R reg.

Ill take some pictures next time im down that way, I wonder if the owner is a ph'er?

JonRB

76,123 posts

279 months

Wednesday 9th May 2007
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There is only one road-going Elise GT1

I saw it at Goodwood FOS in 2003



GKP

15,099 posts

248 months

Wednesday 9th May 2007
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Didn't it use to be Azure (or similar) Blue?

kevin ritson

3,423 posts

234 months

Thursday 10th May 2007
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Yep - see my previous post. I have pictures of it from the Lotus 50th at Brands in '98 when it was that colour.


Edited by kevin ritson on Thursday 10th May 09:44

Trackside

1,777 posts

240 months

Thursday 10th May 2007
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It made an appearance at Silverstone last weekend too.

ikemi

8,496 posts

212 months

Friday 11th May 2007
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Incredible looking cars - You could race the Lotus GT1 on Need For Speed 2 for the PC back in 1997