Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsSauber

Sauber loses van der Garde appeal

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Sauber has lost its appeal against a court order that it must run Giedo van der Garde as one of its race drivers this season.

Van der Garde claimed Sauber had reneged on a deal for him to race this season, with the Supreme Court of Victoria ruling in his favour on Wednesday. Sauber immediately appealed the decision, with the hearing running in to Thursday before being rejected by the three appeal judges late in the afternoon.

As a result, Sauber has been ordered to do everything in its power to run van der Garde, who needs to finalise his super licence and have a seat fitting in order to be able to race in Sunday's Australian Grand Prix.

Van der Garde has also sought an enforcement order to ensure Sauber complies, with the team having already named Felipe Nasr and Marcus Ericsson as its race drivers for the 2015 season.

Sauber has yet to comment on the decision.

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.