Ambient 28, Track 23, Humidity 73,Wind speed 2kph
Matt 'Trumpets' Ragsdale dissects the action in Free Practice One, as he goes track side to get all the best views and sense of the speed of these machines.
Practice 1, in typical Formula E
fashion, was anything but a sleepy session despite the hour. Two red
flags and two cars into the wall in various fashions during the
somewhat abbreviated action, which was extended 10 minutes due to the
lengthy nature of the 2nd red flag, while track conditions were
investigated after Jose Maria Lopez trashed his right rear suspension
after riding the kerbs out of turn 12. Fortunately for him, there is
no shortage of garages in the area.
Early running saw the Mahindra's and
Audi's trading fast times, but that fun was quickly ended when
Heidfeld just nosed it into the wall, also in turn 12. This brought
out a short red flag and as running resumed it was Jaguar that
claimed top spot, with Nelson Piquet Jr. taking the honours until
Pechito parked it in the pitlane with the wheel barely attached to
the axle after getting perhaps a bit too aggressive with the kerbs.
Maro Engel noses into the TecPro barrier, startling Trumpets whose close by and captures the moment for prosperity |
Nearly 20 minutes later and with an
extra 10 minutes to play with, it was Audi who finally tipped their
hand with Di Grassi going 1:13.566, shadowed by Buemi just 0.35
seconds back. A weird echo of the title fight that might have been,
save the difficulties both teams encountered this season. As to the
actual championship contenders, Vergne was consistently quicker than
Bird throughout the session, but by the time Maro Engel tasted the
TecPro at the exit of turn 2, the gap was just about half a tenth
between them.
With Vergne needing to outscore Bird by 7 points to
clinch the title in today's race, it was a much needed reassurance to
team Virgin, whose heavier car was put at more of a disadvantage by
the reconfigured track. Also worth watching closely is the fight for
4th in the Constructors, with Mahindra clinging to an 11 point lead
over Jaguar and 17 points over Renault. FP1 times seemed to favor
Jaguar with Evans significantly faster than the other 3 drivers,
despite Rosenqvists belief that the setup issues Mahindra had been
struggling with have been solved by the team.
0 comments