1990 - Lotus

Monza '89 saw the announcement that Derek Warwick and Martin Donnelly would drive for Camel Lotus in 1990 with Lamborghini V12 engines. This was it. Lotus was still a big name and would surely benefit from 2 British Drivers - the youthful enthusiasm of F3000 hotshot Martin Donnelly (he finished 3rd in the 1988 F3000 series despite only racing in half the championship) from Northern Ireland and the experience and tough racecraft of Warwick. It was also mooted that the link up between Lotus and Lamborghini was, infact, an alliance between Motor Industry heavyweights GM and Chrysler (the respective Parent Companies). RJ Reynolds (through its Camel cigarette brand) supplied a decent budget and Lotus should have improved after 2 indifferent seasons with an indifferent Nelson Piquet and Honda man Satoru Nakajima.

Logic is a wonderful thing. Reality can be more painful.

Lotus was in serious decline by this stage. I somehow doubt that GM or Chrysler actually realised that Lotus and Lamborghini were competing in F1 at the time and it turned out that the budget from Camel was not as substantial as Derek had been led to believe. Therefore, Lotus's position in the top 4 was no longer in any doubt - by 1990 the team was scrapping for minor points places behind McLaren, Ferrari, Williams and Benetton, the latter team having confirmed its place at the top table with 2 victories in 1990, courtesy of none other than.... Nelson Piquet! As suggested earlier, Ayrton Senna was probably right that Lotus was no longer a top team - he left at the end of 1987 to join McLaren to realise his title ambitions. The team that Colin Chapman built continued to "compete" in F1 until 1994. Derek and Martin Donnelly quickly realised that the Lotus 102 was junk. It was slow and unreliable! Derek used his experience and grit and tried his best while his young teammate had the enthusiasm of youth to drive round the car's problems. The car was so unstable that Derek said "I've never felt that way about a racing car before, but I just don't like it - don't like being near it... I've taken more risks this season than at any time since I've been in Formula 1".

Derek's best qualifying performances were at Imola and Jerez in 10th place - Jerez in particular a credit to Derek's resilience after Donnelly's practice crash saw the Irishman fighting for his life after being thrown from the cockpit. Donnelly would never race in F1 again - the closest being a test session arranged by Eddie Jordan in 1993. Derek and Martin proved to be quite close in terms of speed - Derek slightly edging the man from Northern Ireland until Jerez. It proved that Derek belonged in the highest echelon of the sport - Donnelly was rated very highly and raced well himself during 1990 - he was certainly destined for great things in F1.

Derek himself hit the headlines at Monza that year after a spectacular crash at the Parabolica at the end of lap 1 where the Lotus slid to a halt on its roll bar in the middle of the pack after running wide on the entry to the corner (see below). Derek ran to the pits for the spare car seemingly unaware of the enormity of the accident. To quote Alan Partridge, this proves that he is a "bloody bloke"! Incidentally, Professor Sid Watkins in his book "Life at the Limit", was hugely impressed as to how calm and composed Derek was in the aftermath of the accident!

By late 1990 Derek's F1 options seemed to be running out - by this stage Team Owners thought of Delboy as "a known quantity" and as such it was always going to be a struggle to secure a drive with a top 4 team... Therefore, Derek decided to sign a contract with Jaguar for a return to World Sportscar racing. However, within a fortnight of Derek signing for Jaguar, Alessandro Nannini's F1 career was over after severing his arm in a helicopter accident. This was prior to the Japanese GP, by which stage most contracts had been agreed for 1991 -  therefore, Warwick would have been top of Benetton's list as replacement for 1991 (they eventually settled on journeyman Roberto Moreno). Derek was out of F1. Personally, I was "gutted" over this. There is no doubt that Derek would have beaten Nelson Piquet had he got the Benetton drive but as with most of his career, Derek did not have that intangible thing called "luck"...

Possibly in an attempt to see out 1990 on a high, Derek drove in the Lombard RAC Rally in a Subaru Legacy with Ronan Morgan as co-driver. Ronan: "That was the most enjoyable rally I've ever done - certainly one I'll remember for the rest of my life". Although they retired when lying 13th on leg 3 of 4 (Keilder) after slipping into a ditch, his impact on the rally attracted plaudits from the rally regulars and was well on course for a top ten finish!

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