  We study the expansion properties of the contracting Lorenz flow introduced
by Rovella via thermodynamic formalism. Specifically, we prove the existence of
an equilibrium state for the natural potential $\hat\phi_t(x,y, z):=-t\log
J_{(x, y, z)}^{cu}$ for the contracting Lorenz flow and for $t$ in an interval
containing $[0,1]$. We also analyse the Lyapunov spectrum of the flow in terms
of the pressure.
