Practice report
Formula E London E-Prix I
London E-Prix: Gunther leads BMW Andretti 1-2 in FP2
Maximilian Gunther led Jake Dennis for a BMW Andretti 1-2 in a rain-soaked second London E-Prix practice session as Stoffel Vandoorne crashed out before even completing a lap.
Matt Kew
Edited: Jul 27, 2021, 9:24 AM
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New York City race one victor Gunther pipped his teammate Dennis to the top of the times, with Gunther’s 1m26.838s lap ensuring he was the only driver to dip under the 1m27s barrier.
Only Oliver Turvey had failed to lap within a tenth of free practice one pacesetter Jean-Eric Vergne’s Friday benchmark, but on Saturday morning the field was hugely spread out.
Valencia race-two winner Dennis was some 0.375s adrift of his stablemate’s best effort, despite using four 35kW attack mode boosts to Gunther’s one in a bid to close the gap.
It was then left to Porsche driver Andre Lotterer to complete the top three, after he ran provisionally fastest but was bumped back in the final minute to fall 0.629s in arrears.
The forecasted rain duly arrived in time for the session, with drivers frequently aquaplaning on the lesser-used perimeter circuit roads that make up the outside portion of the circuit.
Three minutes into the half-hour run, Mercedes driver Stoffel Vandoorne was caught out by the standing water and shunted into the wall on the approach to the Turn 10 right-handed hairpin.
He ripped the front wing assembly off his car and skated in to the run-off, where he could not revive the car to return to the pitlane for repairs. That meant he failed to set a time and was forced to watch the remainder of the session from the wall.
Envision Virgin Racing driver Robin Frijns was another to be caught out, with the Dutch racer crumpling the nose of his car when he skated sideways down the track at Turn 6.
Frijns had been managing oversteer through the preceding corners, but then lost the rear as the track sloped downhill and skidded parallel to the concrete wall before eventually making contact.
He was able to rejoin from the run-off after a minor brush with the TecPro barrier, eventually running to only the 22nd fastest time.
Sergio Sette Camara soon followed suit down at Turn 6, losing the rear and sliding into the run-off area that had only just been vacated by Frijns.
The Dragon Penske Autosport driver would, however, post the fifth quickest time behind Mahindra Racing driver Alex Lynn.
The second Mercedes of Nyck de Vries ran to sixth place ahead of Rene Rast and the two Nissan e.dams, with Sebastien Buemi eclipsing his teammate Oliver Rowland.
Edoardo Mortara rounded out the top 10 for Venturi, while Mitch Evans led points leader and Jaguar Racing teammate Sam Bird in 11th place.
The DS Techeetahs would wind up two seconds off the pace, reigning champion Antonio Felix da Costa clocking 18th as teammate Jean-Eric Vergne was 19th.
Lucas di Grassi was also forced to abandon the session early when he made a rare mistake aboard his Audi machine at Turn 9, hitting the inside wall and damaging his suspension.
Practice results:
Cla # Driver Team Time Gap 1 28 
Maximilian Gunther 
Andretti Autosport 1'26.838 2 27 
Jake Dennis Andretti Autosport 1'27.213 0.375 3 36 Andre Lotterer Porsche Team 1'27.467 0.629 4 94 Alex Lynn 
Mahindra Racing 1'27.499 0.661 5 7 
Sergio Sette Camara Dragon Racing 1'27.508 0.670 6 17 
Nyck de Vries Mercedes 1'27.781 0.943 7 33 René Rast Team Abt 1'27.782 0.944 8 23 
Sébastien Buemi 
DAMS 1'27.792 0.954 9 22 Oliver Rowland DAMS 1'27.795 0.957 10 48 Edoardo Mortara 
Venturi 1'27.932 1.094 11 20 
Mitch Evans Jaguar Racing 1'27.959 1.121 12 10 Sam Bird Jaguar Racing 1'28.103 1.265 13 99 Pascal Wehrlein Porsche Team 1'28.262 1.424 14 29 Alexander Sims Mahindra Racing 1'28.324 1.486 15 88 Tom Blomqvist NIO Formula E Team 1'28.451 1.613 16 71 Norman Nato Venturi 1'28.740 1.902 17 8 Oliver Turvey NIO Formula E Team 1'28.898 2.060 18 13 
Antonio Felix da Costa 
Techeetah 1'28.902 2.064 19 25 Jean-Eric Vergne Techeetah 1'28.985 2.147 20 6 
Joel Eriksson Dragon Racing 1'29.256 2.418 21 37 Nick Cassidy Virgin Racing 1'29.330 2.492 22 4 Robin Frijns Virgin Racing 1'29.370 2.532 23 11 Lucas di Grassi Team Abt 1'29.689 2.851 24 5 
Stoffel Vandoorne Mercedes no time
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