Lotus F1 Team
A confident Pastor Maldonado says he is not ruling out the possibility of Lotus claiming its first podium of 2014 at next weekend's Monaco Grand Prix.
Maldonado finished the second test in Barcelona at the front of the field after setting the quickest lap time on super soft tyres.
The Venezuelan, who has previously shown good form around the streets of Monaco, refused to rule out the possibility of claiming a top three finish.
"You never know," he said when asked about his podium prospects. "In Monaco you need to be very lucky, especially with the traffic in qualifying, especially in Q2, but if you put everything together, why not?"
"It’ll be a tough race. Mercedes is very quick, I will do my best. I think it will be possible to be competitive, a bit more than here, we have more mileage and confidence with the car. Hopefully it’ll be much better."
Maldonado, who said he had a 'few new parts' on the Lotus E22 said he is confident that the team is now firmly on an upwards trajectory after a difficult start to the season.
"Today was important to run our programme and we completed all of our plan which is positive," he said. "About the result, we are happy as we did not have any big issue. We are learning more from the car, getting better and better.
"For sure it’s a big step forward, today was important for us to try different things and we did a good programme, quite busy to be honest and we learned a lot. Hopefully it’ll be much better for the rest of the season for us."
