Marrakech E-Prix: Vergne leads DS Techeetah 1-2 in practice

Vergne had opened the session with an immediate lap in the 1m20s, FP2 going without the phase of rapid track evolution that FP1 had with much of the circuit having not been used for nearly two years. Times then quickly moved into the 1m20s and beyond.

Da Costa quickly brought the session into the 1m19s, before Jaguar's Mitch Evans claimed a lap nearly half a second clear of the Portuguese driver after five minutes.

But just as the drivers were closing in on the best lap from FP1, Alexander Sims hit the wall on the exit of Turn 7 and brought out a red flag as his Mahindra was extricated off the road.

Five minutes was added back onto the run-time to make up for the red flag pause and, once the track was declared clear, reigning champion Nyck de Vries immediately bagged a 1m17.921s to set the fastest time of the weekend at that stage.

The Techeetah pair then returned to the front, with da Costa grabbing a 1m17.610s and Vergne setting a devilish 1m17.666s to slot into second.

But the two were beaten by a good lap from Pascal Wehrlein, who punched in a 1m17.518s, before the Porsche driver fell to Evans’ sword as the Kiwi went just under a tenth faster.

Techeetah had one final ace card up its sleeve however, with Vergne putting together a late flyer to bag a 1m17.278s to cement top spot, with da Costa following just over a tenth behind.

Evans had to be satisfied with third, while NIO 333’s Oliver Turvey was a scant 0.001s away from the Jaguar driver to claim the fourth-best lap.

Oliver Turvey, NIO 333 Racing, NIO 333 001

Photo by: Andrew Ferraro / Motorsport Images

Wehrlein was fifth from Nissan’s Sebastien Buemi, who gets a three-place grid penalty for the race in Morocco following contact with de Vries in FP1.

As Friday’s session reached its conclusion, Buemi and de Vries’ incident at the final corner produced a yellow flag – ensuring nobody had the opportunity to topple Edoardo Mortara from the top of the FP1 timing board.

Mortara’s benchmark from FP1 was a 1m18.670s, as his Venturi team-mate Lucas di Grassi went 0.3s behind and briefly into second before Vergne then split the two on the timing boards moments later.

Sergio Sette Camara placed seventh in the FP2 times, before bringing out a yellow flag at Turn 7 which stopped a late flying lap from Nick Cassidy, while Andretti’s Oliver Askew ended the session in eighth – ahead of Sam Bird and di Grassi.

Marrakech E-Prix FP2 results

Cla	Driver	Team	Time	Gap
1	Jean-Eric Vergne	Techeetah	1'17.278
2	Antonio Felix da Costa	Techeetah	1'17.407	0.129
3	Mitch Evans	Jaguar Racing	1'17.440	0.162
4	Oliver Turvey	NIO Formula E Team	1'17.441	0.163
5	Pascal Wehrlein	Porsche Team	1'17.518	0.240
6	Sébastien Buemi	DAMS	1'17.656	0.378
7	Sergio Sette Camara	Dragon Racing	1'17.749	0.471
8	Oliver Askew	Andretti Autosport	1'17.839	0.561
9	Sam Bird	Jaguar Racing	1'17.902	0.624
10	Lucas di Grassi	Venturi	1'17.905	0.627
11	Nyck de Vries	Mercedes	1'17.921	0.643
12	Oliver Rowland	Mahindra Racing	1'17.922	0.644
13	Antonio Giovinazzi	Dragon Racing	1'18.049	0.771
14	Dan Ticktum	NIO Formula E Team	1'18.061	0.783
15	Stoffel Vandoorne	Mercedes	1'18.091	0.813
16	Edoardo Mortara	Venturi	1'18.117	0.839
17	Jake Dennis	Andretti Autosport	1'18.154	0.876
18	Maximilian Gunther	DAMS	1'18.280	1.002
19	Robin Frijns	Virgin Racing	1'18.361	1.083
20	Andre Lotterer	Porsche Team	1'18.772	1.494
21	Nick Cassidy	Virgin Racing	1'19.148	1.870
22	Alexander Sims	Mahindra Racing
View full results

Marrakech E-Prix FP1 results

Cla	Driver	Team	Time	Gap
1	Edoardo Mortara	Venturi	1'18.670
2	Jean-Eric Vergne	Techeetah	1'18.836	0.166
3	Lucas di Grassi	Venturi	1'18.969	0.299
4	Andre Lotterer	Porsche Team	1'18.993	0.323
5	Oliver Rowland	Mahindra Racing	1'19.104	0.434
6	Antonio Felix da Costa	Techeetah	1'19.105	0.435
7	Stoffel Vandoorne	Mercedes	1'19.133	0.463
8	Robin Frijns	Virgin Racing	1'19.438	0.768
9	Sergio Sette Camara	Dragon Racing	1'19.453	0.783
10	Antonio Giovinazzi	Dragon Racing	1'19.513	0.843
11	Oliver Turvey	NIO Formula E Team	1'19.601	0.931
12	Dan Ticktum	NIO Formula E Team	1'19.631	0.961
13	Mitch Evans	Jaguar Racing	1'19.681	1.011
14	Alexander Sims	Mahindra Racing	1'19.957	1.287
15	Maximilian Gunther	DAMS	1'19.965	1.295
16	Nyck de Vries	Mercedes	1'20.089	1.419
17	Sébastien Buemi	DAMS	1'20.195	1.525
18	Pascal Wehrlein	Porsche Team	1'20.226	1.556
19	Nick Cassidy	Virgin Racing	1'20.655	1.985
20	Oliver Askew	Andretti Autosport	1'20.665	1.995
21	Sam Bird	Jaguar Racing	1'20.711	2.041
22	Jake Dennis	Andretti Autosport
View full results