Diriyah E-Prix: Frijns leads in-form de Vries in practice

Having dominated the first Riyadh race on Friday, Mercedes de Vries looked set to continue his unbeaten run in the 45-minute practice session, having broken his own lap record from qualifying and then set a blistering lap of 1m07.440s on his full power run.

But Frijns, who failed to take part in qualifying on Friday after requiring a change of battery, managed to lap the circuit in 1m07.294s in the dying minutes of the session, outpacing his Mercedes rival by 0.146s.

Frijns’ rookie teammate Nick Cassidy also made a late lunge up the order, his effort of 1m07.449s putting him third ahead of Oliver Rowland, who was the first driver to break into the 1m07s in practice using last season's Nissan powertrain. 

Reigning champion Antonio Felix da Costa (DS Techeetah) ended up just over two tenths off the pace in fifth, recovering from a horrific performance in the first of the Diriyah races that left him well outside the points.

Edoardo Mortara was a promising sixth after scoring a podium for Mercedes’ customer Venturi on Friday, ahead of the works car of Stoffel Vandoorne.

But the 34-year-old was involved in a massive crash after the chequered flag was dropped, his Venturi car mysteriously heading straight into the wall at Turn 18 after his practice start on the back straight.

Mortara has been taken away in an ambulance as a precautionary measure but is conscious and talking, and can move both his fingers and toes.

Sebastien Buemi was eighth in the second of the two Nissans, ahead of the Jaguar of Sam Bird and the factory Audi of Lucas di Grassi.

The BMWs of Jake Dennis and Maximilian Gunther finished 12th and 17th respectively, the latter ending up more than a second off the pace, while two-time champion Jean-Eric Vergne could only finish 14th in the second DS Techeetah.

The only red flag of the session was caused by Andre Lotterer, who hit the wall at Turn 11 before coming to a rest at the following corner with visible damage to his Porsche.

Lotterer’s teammate Pascal Wehrlein, who qualified on the front row on Friday, was 18th quickest.

Practice results:

Cla	#	Driver		Team	Time	Gap
1	4	Robin Frijns		Virgin Racing	1'07.294
2	17	Nyck de Vries		Mercedes-EQ Formula E Team	1'07.440	0.146
3	37	Nick Cassidy		Virgin Racing	1'07.449	0.155
4	22	Oliver Rowland		DAMS	1'07.452	0.158
5	13	Antonio Felix da Costa		Techeetah	1'07.512	0.218
6	48	Edoardo Mortara		Venturi	1'07.548	0.254
7	5	Stoffel Vandoorne		Mercedes-EQ Formula E Team	1'07.562	0.268
8	23	Sébastien Buemi		DAMS	1'07.749	0.455
9	10	Sam Bird		Jaguar Racing	1'07.778	0.484
10	11	Lucas di Grassi		Team Abt	1'07.884	0.590
11	8	Oliver Turvey		NIO Formula E Team	1'08.017	0.723
12	27	Jake Dennis		Andretti Autosport	1'08.027	0.733
13	33	René Rast		Team Abt	1'08.190	0.896
14	25	Jean-Eric Vergne		Techeetah	1'08.191	0.897
15	88	Tom Blomqvist		NIO Formula E Team	1'08.250	0.956
16	71	Norman Nato		Venturi	1'08.256	0.962
17	28	Maximilian Gunther		Andretti Autosport	1'08.318	1.024
18	99	Pascal Wehrlein		Porsche Team	1'08.398	1.104
19	94	Alex Lynn		Mahindra Racing	1'08.530	1.236
20	6	Nico Müller		DRAGON / PENSKE AUTOSPORT	1'08.603	1.309
21	20	Mitch Evans		Jaguar Racing	1'08.653	1.359
22	29	Alexander Sims		Mahindra Racing	1'08.843	1.549
23	7	Sergio Sette Camara		DRAGON / PENSKE AUTOSPORT	1'08.846	1.552
24	36	Andre Lotterer		Porsche Team	1'09.801	2.507
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