Lotus to race after court action

The Lotus Praga LMP2 team has been cleared to race in the Le Mans 24 Hours after a court hearing saw it overturn a judgement that threatened to see it miss the French classic.

The team was at risk of missing the race after a number of components from its T128 Coupes were seized at the circuit on Tuesday evening, putting the team in a position where it would be unable to compete.

A hearing at a court in Le Mans on Wednesday afternoon resulted in a judge ruling in favour of the team and overturned the initial ruling, which had been brought by Adess AG - the company that had designed the Lotus Praga machine.

In a statement, the team insisted that the initial ruling had been made based on ficticious invoices presented by Adess, who were instead in debt to the team.

It also revealed that the Kodewa-owned outfit had started legal action of its own earlier this week prior to the components being seized the following the day.

"Lotus Praga LMP2/Kodewa have instructed their lawyers to file a criminal complaint against St?phane Chosse, Adess AG and SCE Solutions on Monday, 17th June 2013," the statement read. "St?phane Chosse is in debt and owes Kodewa a seven-figure amount. Chosse presented fictitious and not justified invoices to the court in France. He insisted that Kodewa is in debt. This is not true.

"On Tuesday evening (18th June), a bailiff seized parts of the Lotus Praga T128 LMP2 cars. The court in Le Mans decided this afternoon (19th June) to give the seized parts back to the team as the allegations were reasonless.

"Kodewa will take further action against St?phane Chosse, Adess AG and SCE Solutions."

The #31 Lotus T128 was able to take part in practice for the 90th running of the famous race, but the sister car was unable to hit the track due to the missing parts and is now being worked on ahead of first qualifying.