Vergne tops red flagged FP2

Jean-Eric Vergne timed his 200kw lap to perfection to finish fastest in a shortened FP2 in Santiago.

The Techeetah driver set his best lap of 1:18.662 just moments before the session was red flagged with a couple of minutes to go after an accident for Nico Prost after he locked up under braking for turn 9. The Renault e.Dams driver was off the racing line going into the corner and as a result, understeered into the wall, causing damage to the front end of the car.

At the time of the accident, Panasonic Jaguar Racing’s Mitch Evans and Venturi’s Edo Mortara were both on 200kw laps and Evans had set an outright best time in the opening sector.

As a result, Techeetah’s Vergne was fastest with DS Virgin Racing’s Alex Lynn in second despite having gone slower on his 200kw lap compared to his 180kw lap and Evans was third. The Mahindra drivers, Nick Heidfeld and Felix Rosenqvist were fourth and fifth respectively, both having set their lap times with 200kw.

Sam Bird came sixth for DS Virgin Racing having done a lap at 200kw with Venturi’s Edo Mortara in seventh. Eighth was the Audi Sport Abt Schaeffler entry of Daniel Abt with Prost’s teammate, Sebastian Buemi in ninth and Lucas Di Grassi rounding out the top 10 for Audi Sport Abt Schaeffler.

Oliver Turvey was 11th for NIO after a scrappy 200kw lap. Jose Maria Lopez was the fastest of the Dragon Racing entries despite brushing the wall causing his session to end earlier than he would have liked. Luca Filippi was 13th in the other Nio, just ahead of Lopez’s teammate at Dragon, Jerome D’Ambrosio. Antonio Felix da Costa was the highest of the MS&AD Andretti cars in 15th in what was an improvement over FP1.

Andre Lotterer’s baptism of fire in Formula E continued as he came home in 16th ahead of the inaugural champion, Nelson Piquet, who was a lowly 17^th and had a trip down the escape road at Turn 3. Maro Engel’s struggles continued as he was 18th ahead of da Costa’s teammate, Tom Blomqvist in 19^th. In 20th was Prost after his accident went he wasn’t able to set a representative time on 200kw.