Wehrlein tops final morning of pre-season Formula E test

Mahindra Racing’s Wehrlein grabbed the top spot as the three-hour session entered its final 15 minutes, which were then cut short when BMW Andretti driver Alexander Sims crashed at the chicane on the start/finish straight.

Wehrlein’s 1m15.190s is 0.187s quicker than Robin Frijns’s best time from the second day of the test on Wednesday.

Dragon Racing driver Nico Muller trailed Wehrlein by just 0.008s in second place, with DS Techeetah’s Antonio Felix da Costa shuffled back to third after leading most of the running on Friday morning.

Maximilian Gunther finished fourth for BMW, ahead of Sebastien Buemi (Nissan e.dams) – who also enjoyed a brief stint at the top of the times – and Sims, who damaged the right-front corner of his car in the session’s dying moments.

Sims hit the barriers at the exit of the tight right-left-right chicane on the Circuit Ricardo Tormo’s main straight and pulled over, which caused the only red flag of the morning and ended the session a few minutes early.

Mitch Evans was seventh ahead of reigning champion Jean-Eric Vergne, initial Friday pacesetter Felipe Massa (Venturi) and Virgin’s Sam Bird.

Audi drivers Daniel Abt and Lucas di Grassi ended up just outside the top 10 in 11th and 12th.

New FE entrants Mercedes and Porsche had a quiet start to Friday, with Stoffel Vandoorne and Nyck de Vries taking P15 and P20 for the former.

Porsche pair Andre Lotterer and Neel Jani were 16th and 22nd, as NIO’s Oliver Turvey and Ma Qing Hua brought up the rear of the field.

The test will conclude with a final three-hour session on Friday afternoon, which will start with another ‘test race’.

Vandoorne won the first ‘race’ on Wednesday.

Session results

Pos.	#	Driver	Team	Time	Gap	Laps
1	94	Pascal Wehrlein	Mahindra	1'15.190		38
2	7	Nico Muller	Dragon	1'15.198	0.008	35
3	13	Antonio Felix da Costa	DS Techeetah	1'15.293	0.103	39
4	28	Maximilian Gunther	BMW	1'15.296	0.106	48
5	23	Sebastien Buemi	Nissan	1'15.328	0.138	34
6	27	Alexander Sims	BMW	1'15.359	0.169	39
7	20	Mitch Evans	Jaguar	1'15.366	0.176	31
8	25	Jean-Eric Vergne	DS Techeetah	1'15.480	0.290	35
9	19	Felipe Massa	Venturi	1'15.504	0.314	38
10	2	Sam Bird	Virgin	1'15.576	0.386	38
11	66	Daniel Abt	Audi	1'15.673	0.483	31
12	11	Lucas di Grassi	Audi	1'15.675	0.485	30
13	6	Brendon Hartley	Dragon	1'15.682	0.492	36
14	48	Edoardo Mortara	Venturi	1'15.684	0.494	44
15	5	Stoffel Vandoorne	Mercedes	1'15.736	0.546	39
16	36	Andre Lotterer	Porsche	1'15.809	0.619	29
17	4	Robin Frijns	Virgin	1'15.819	0.629	35
18	22	Oliver Rowland	Nissan	1'15.867	0.677	26
19	51	James Calado	Jaguar	1'15.880	0.690	46
20	17	Nyck de Vries	Mercedes	1'15.916	0.726	54
21	64	Jerome d'Ambrosio	Mahindra	1'16.082	0.892	32
22	18	Neel Jani	Porsche	1'16.158	0.968	34
23	3	Oliver Turvey	NIO	1'16.610	1.420	32
24	33	Ma Qing Hua	NIO	1'17.047	1.857	25