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Mexico Formula E: Bird fastest in practice as Abt flown to hospital

Envision Virgin Racing driver Sam Bird was fastest in practice for the Mexico City Formula E race, while Audi's Daniel Abt was flown to hospital after the first session

Bird, who won the opening race of the 2019-20 season in Saudi Arabia, posted a benchmark time of 1m07.673s with three minutes to run in second practice.

He was best of a flurry of drivers who posted late 250kW full-power flying laps, leading the way over the DS Techeetah of Antonio Felix da Costa by 0.119 seconds.

At the halfway stage of the run Jaguar driver Mitch Evans went quickest on a 1m08.509s, although he remained under investigation for exceeding track limits at Turn 16.

He then improved late on by half a second to climb to an eventual third, but that included losing three tenths in the second sector.

The 2015-16 champion, Sebastien Buemi - yet to score a point this season - ran fourth ahead of Mercedes driver and points leader Stoffel Vandoorne.

Behind Robin Frijns was Andre Lotter and the Mahindra of Pascal Wehrlein. Both he and team-mate Jerome D'Ambrosio will start from the back of the grid after resorting to a third gearbox already this season.

Lucas di Grassi was ninth quickest, as reigning champion Jean-Eric Vergne rounded out the top 10.

The DS Techeetah pilot had set the fastest opening sector by four tenths, but lost that time again in the second part of the lap.

Santiago winner Maximilian Guenther was only 16th following a session in which he shunted into the barrier at Turn 9 after a big lock up under braking.

Edoardo Mortara was just 21st, having topped a shortened opening practice run with a 1m09.273s benchmark on a still-drying track after thunderstorms the previous night.

That gave the Venturi driver a 0.347s cushion over Wehrlein, who in turn out-paced D'Ambrosio and Felipe Massa.

Abt brought out a red flag in the first free practice session when he shunted heavily with 12 minutes to go.

The Audi driver's car suffered a software error and he ploughed straight on at Turn 9 - where the circuit enters the stadium section after a long back straight - and wound up buried in the TecPro barrier.

After triggering a G-force meter for exceeding a reading of 16, Abt was taken to hospital by helicopter - due to distance rather than severity - for further examination as a precautionary measure.

The session did not resume owing to the lengthy repairs required.

That caused a subsequent 25-minute delay to the start of qualifying for the Jaguar I-PACE eTrophy support series, which was then abandoned altogether.

Abt was unable to take part in second practice; meanwhile his Audi team was constructing a new car around team-mate di Grassi's spare tub.

It has since confirmed that Abt will not take part in qualifying, though Audi is expecting him to be able to race.

Audi has come to Mexico without a reserve driver.

FP1 times

Pos Driver Team Car Gap Laps
1 Edoardo Mortara Venturi Mercedes 1m09.273s 19
2 Pascal Wehrlein Mahindra Mahindra 0.347s 22
3 Jerome d'Ambrosio Mahindra Mahindra 0.814s 18
4 Felipe Massa Venturi Mercedes 1.053s 21
5 Stoffel Vandoorne Mercedes Mercedes 1.137s 20
6 Lucas di Grassi Audi Audi 1.345s 21
7 Sebastien Buemi Nissan e.dams Nissan 1.394s 22
8 Nico Muller Dragon Penske 1.467s 18
9 Andre Lotterer Porsche Porsche 1.498s 19
10 Antonio Felix da Costa DS Techeetah DS 1.526s 18
11 Mitch Evans Jaguar Jaguar 1.615s 21
12 Nyck de Vries Mercedes Mercedes 1.675s 21
13 Brendon Hartley Dragon Penske 1.981s 19
14 James Calado Jaguar Jaguar 1.982s 20
15 Neel Jani Porsche Porsche 2.172s 21
16 Jean-Eric Vergne DS Techeetah DS 2.254s 18
17 Sam Bird Virgin Audi 2.315s 19
18 Robin Frijns Virgin Audi 2.366s 19
19 Alexander Sims BMW BMW 2.582s 21
20 Maximilian Guenther BMW BMW 2.585s 10
21 Oliver Turvey NIO NIO 2.829s 20
22 Oliver Rowland Nissan e.dams Nissan 3.138s 19
23 Daniel Abt Audi Audi 3.191s 17
24 Ma Qinghua NIO NIO 6.400s 14

FP2 times

Pos Driver Team Car Gap Laps
1 Sam Bird Virgin Audi 1m07.672s 15
2 Antonio Felix da Costa DS Techeetah DS 0.119s 16
3 Mitch Evans Jaguar Jaguar 0.353s 17
4 Sebastien Buemi Nissan e.dams Nissan 0.413s 17
5 Stoffel Vandoorne Mercedes Mercedes 0.431s 17
6 Robin Frijns Virgin Audi 0.476s 15
7 Andre Lotterer Porsche Porsche 0.495s 17
8 Pascal Wehrlein Mahindra Mahindra 0.509s 17
9 Lucas di Grassi Audi Audi 0.632s 15
10 Jean-Eric Vergne DS Techeetah DS 0.682s 16
11 Jerome d'Ambrosio Mahindra Mahindra 0.870s 11
12 Neel Jani Porsche Porsche 0.937s 18
13 Felipe Massa Venturi Mercedes 1.011s 20
14 Nico Muller Dragon Penske 1.031s 17
15 Nyck de Vries Mercedes Mercedes 1.041s 18
16 Maximilian Guenther BMW BMW 1.296s 19
17 James Calado Jaguar Jaguar 1.468s 18
18 Alexander Sims BMW BMW 1.489s 15
19 Brendon Hartley Dragon Penske 1.691s 17
20 Oliver Rowland Nissan e.dams Nissan 1.745s 19
21 Edoardo Mortara Venturi Mercedes 1.973s 20
22 Ma Qinghua NIO NIO 3.108s 14
23 Oliver Turvey NIO NIO 3.158s 12


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