The Lotus F1 team remain confident that they can keep their position as the best of the rookie teams come the end of 2010, despite now having abandoned their development work on the 2010 car in favour of next season's machine.
The team currently sits 10th in the constructors standings, ahead of HRT and Virgin Racing by virtue of their best finishes, with none of the newbie teams having scored a point in 2010 so far.
And the Lotus technical chief Mike Gascoyne has said that he is confident that the Malaysian-owned team can remain in front over the remaining races, despite a lack of new parts.
"The focus now is really on the 2011 car, so we won't be bringing any major new parts to Singapore," he admitted in the team's preview for the Singapore race.
But he added: "Despite that, I think we'll be able to maintain the advantage we have over our nearest rivals on what is a pretty high downforce track. The track is bumpy and some of the kerbs are pretty high, so being able to deal with the bumps and the kerbs well is important.
"Both our drivers have reported that they feel like the car deals well with uneven surfaces, and they have the confidence to attack the kerbs in the T127, so let's see what happens."
The team are expected to make a series of announcements over their future at the Singapore GP weekend, with the squad expected to confirm that they have the rights to use the 'Team Lotus' name from the start of the 2011 season.
They are also expected to confirm their switch from Cosworth to Renault power for next season.
But a further series of rumours have gone as far as suggesting that the team cound confirm a technical collaboration with the Toyota Motorsport company.
The Japanese company withdrew from Formula One at the end of the 2009 season, but the Italian Autosprint publication has claimed that the motorsport arm of the company will link up with Lotus instead.
The deal is rumoured to come from the link with Gascoyne, the former Toyota technical chief.
Toyota have also been linked with a collaboration with the Hispania Racing team for next season, and are currently providing Pirelli with a 2009-spec car for their in-season tyre testing.
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