Rome E-Prix: Second FE practice aborted due to kerb damage

Formula E cancelled the second practice session ahead of the Rome E-Prix after only 10 minutes of running as a kerb breakage could not be repaired in time.

The second 30-minute run was red flagged early on as the inside kerb at Turn 12 of the chicane worked itself loose after final hits from Mahindra Racing driver Alex Lynn and Nico Muller.

Drivers were informed by race director Scot Elkins that the session would resume, but after a 40-minute stoppage, Elkins eventually abandoned the session.

This was chiefly to allow sufficient time for the cars to be recharged in time for the qualifying session an hour later.

It is understood that the kerb will now be removed altogether to leave only the inside wall to define the edge of the circuit at Turn 12.

The extensive delays did however allow Tom Blomqvist and Jake Dennis to get back into their repaired cars after being involved in two red-flag incidents during first practice.

BMW Andretti driver Maximilian Guenther topped the very limited running courtesy of a 1m39.517s laptime, which was 0.8s slower than Lucas di Grassi’s FP1 benchmark.

But Gunether, who failed to finish either race in the Saudi Arabia double-header event, did run 0.192s clear of next-best Nyck de Vries.

That led a Mercedes 2-3 finish ahead of Nissan e.dams runner Oliver Rowland and Dragon Penske Autosport’s Muller.

Nyck de Vries, Mercedes Benz EQ, EQ Silver Arrow 02

Photo by: Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images

Both teams were set to debut their new cars for the 2021 season in Rome but delays, with Nissan citing the pandemic as hindering parts supply, means those introductions will be held off until the Monaco E-Prix on 8 May.

With Oliver Turvey and Jean-Eric Vergne on the sidelines for second practice as a result of the earlier multi-car pile-up when an unsighted NIO 333 driver ploughed into a queue of cars lining up for practice starts, only 20 drivers completed a lap.

Dennis was critical of a lack of yellow and red flags prior to the incident at the blind Turn 6, describing the marshalling as "a poor effort".

“It's a completely blind this corner," he said.

"Even during the session, I was thinking 'if someone crashes here, for sure you hit them'. He couldn't do anything by the time he saw us.”

Rome E-Prix - FP2 results:

Cla	#	Driver	Team	Time	Gap
1	28	Maximilian Gunther	Andretti Autosport	1'39.517
2	17	Nyck de Vries	Mercedes-EQ Formula E Team	1'39.709	0.192
3	5	Stoffel Vandoorne	Mercedes-EQ Formula E Team	1'39.900	0.383
4	22	Oliver Rowland	DAMS	1'39.924	0.407
5	6	Nico Müller	DRAGON / PENSKE AUTOSPORT	1'39.961	0.444
6	37	Nick Cassidy	Virgin Racing	1'40.042	0.525
7	20	Mitch Evans	Jaguar Racing	1'40.232	0.715
8	99	Pascal Wehrlein	Porsche Team	1'40.530	1.013
9	10	Sam Bird	Jaguar Racing	1'40.995	1.478
10	13	Antonio Felix da Costa	Techeetah	1'41.085	1.568
11	23	Sébastien Buemi	DAMS	1'41.551	2.034
12	11	Lucas di Grassi	Team Abt	1'41.691	2.174
13	7	Sergio Sette Camara	DRAGON / PENSKE AUTOSPORT	1'41.924	2.407
14	33	René Rast	Team Abt	1'42.027	2.510
15	94	Alex Lynn	Mahindra Racing	1'42.606	3.089
16	29	Alexander Sims	Mahindra Racing	1'43.262	3.745
17	71	Norman Nato	Venturi	1'43.277	3.760
18	48	Edoardo Mortara	Venturi	1'44.362	4.845
19	36	Andre Lotterer	Porsche Team	1'51.099	11.582
20	4	Robin Frijns	Virgin Racing	1'56.157	16.640
21	8	Oliver Turvey	NIO Formula E Team
22	25	Jean-Eric Vergne	Techeetah
23	27	Jake Dennis	Andretti Autosport
24	88	Tom Blomqvist	NIO Formula E Team
View full results