Nick Heidfeld’s management team has confirmed that legal action is ongoing in London an attempt to get the German driver back in the cockpit at Lotus Renault.
They say that a legal process will take place after the Italian GP and hope that Heidfeld can be in the car for Singapore.
A statement tonight said: “Nick Heidfeld who still has a valid contract as main driver with LRGP is set to continue legal proceedings before the High Court of London after LRGP has temporarily been allowed to let Bruno Senna drive in Nick’s place until a final decision at a full trial which will take place after the Monza Grand Prix.”
“I was surprised by the Team’s intention to replace me and regret that things have developed this way,” said Heidfeld in the statement. “I just wanted to be in the cockpit to get the best result for the team and me. I still have a clear contract and I want to drive.’”
Nick’s lawyer, Dr. Stefan Seitz, explained: “The interlocutory decision of the court does not infringe on the fact that Nick has a valid contract to be one of the two main drivers of the team. This position is disputed by the team for apparently purely financial reasons. We do not intend to rest before Nick’s legal position has been fully restored.”
His manager Andre Theuerzeit added: “I am disappointed that the team is allowed to let another driver take Nick’s seat for the next weekends. However, I certainly am confident that we will be able to enforce a fair solution for Nick in the further proceedings. We all hope that Nick will be back in the cockpit in Singapore.”
It’s unusual for a driver contract matter to end up in court rather than with the Contract Recognition Board.
Adam Cooper F1 
What does all this mean financially? If Nick has lost the teams confidence then legal action is pointless in terms of getting back into the car long term. Does he not get paid his full annual salary anyway? Might there be performance clauses in the contract?
Good questiosn, fact is we don’t know enough about what’s going in. Clearly he genuinely wants to get in the car and the secondary consideration, albeit an important one, is that he gets paid in full. But as we know it’ll be a bit awkward if he does get the seat back…
What a bunch of bumbling idiots the management of Renault have turned out to be.
It’s being reported elsewhere that $enna brings 10 million euros to a cash-strapped team.
Nick is a professional driver who is paid.
This is all about money, nothing to do with performance.
Nick is delivering exactly what we expected of him, bringing the car home exactly where its performance dictates.
What has skewed things slightly is that Nick has been involved in several incidents and accidents, which we’ve never seen in his career.
Only one -at the Nurburgring- can be firmly blamed on Nick.
The others have been pure bad luck.
And lets not forget, Nick has twice had races ruined by an car which with a design flaw which sees it catch fire if the driver holds the throttle open too long!
Without these factors he’d have far more points.
But he has still scored six times in ten races and is eighth in the championship!
Sure, Nick can’t drive beyond the car’s limitations like a true topliner, but there’s only a handful of those guys in Formula 1.
Renault had one in Kubica but allowed him to go rallying, a foolish indulgence for the team’s most valuable asset.
Kubica probably won’t be back.
Can they afford to get someone as good?
Of course they can’t!
The team are losing the development race and Nick is being scapegoated to give them an excuse to generate extra revenue.
And what do they expect from $enna?
He was slower than Christian Klien last year and barely faster than Sakon Yamamoto.
Good on Nick for having the balls to take the team to court.
He strikes me as being extremely mentally tough.
I’m sure he’d have no problem getting back in a Renault when the judge makes the correct decision.
Either than or Nick will be paid out the rest of his contract plus a substantial sum for damage to his reputation.
In which case he’ll trouser a large portion of $enna’s 10 million.
As I said, what idiots Renault management team are…
Regardless of the courts ruling, this will put a seal on NH’s F1 career. At the start of ’11 there was no hope of a race seat anywhere. Even if the team is in the wrong Nick should have bowed out gracefully, thanked the team for the opportunity, and kept his name out there on whatever positive he has left. You really, really want to drive for the TEAM that you are sueing???? Come on Nick….you’ve just been replaced by a HRT outcast, OUCH!
It would have been wise for Hiedfeld to step back from this and at the most go to the CRB given he is slightly ahead of his team mate in points. Especially since all we know of Senna is last year at HRT, LRGP may want Nick back in short order.