Son of 2-Eleven: Lotus plotting hardcore track-day special

Lotus will finally replace its Elise-based 2-Eleven track-day hero with a car that will be almost 70 per cent more powerful.

Called the 3-Eleven the new roofless road-legal racer is being developed to be the world’s fastest sub-£100,000 ($185,000) car to lap the Nurburgring with a time of just over seven minutes. This would make it just a few seconds slower than cars like the McLaren P1, LaFerrari and the Porsche 918.

Based on the aluminium monocoque from the Elise the 3-Eleven is expected to use plenty of weight-saving composites like carbon-fibre reinforced plastics to save weight. It will also have a trick inspired by the firm’s race cars.

Said to be priced at around $130,000 the new 3-Eleven will be powered by the same Toyota-sourced 300kW/410Nm 3.5-litre V6 that’s already used in the Evora 400 – except in the lighter car it’s expected to have at least another 15-20kW.

With a kerbweight expected to be less than 800kg the 3-Eleven is anticipated to hit the 100km/h benchmark in around 3.0 seconds and reach almost 300km/h — both crucial for it to claim its seven minute ‘Ring time.