In the second free practice in Portland, we’ve got a mix of drivers in Top 3, starting with Nato followed by Gunther and Bird.
Photo credits: Formula E Media Bank / Sam Bagnall
It’s time for another practice session in Portland! Where the one earlier today was a testing ground for all of the drivers, the second session should provide us with a bit more insight into how competitive the teams will be around the latest addition to the Formula E calendar.
We’ve got the green lights at he end of the pitlane and all of the drivers made it onto the track. The session started with 18C of air temperature and 29C of track temperature, significantly lower than during FP1 but all’s ahead of us in the upcoming qualifying and race later today.
The first driver to set a lap time was Rast, with the time of 1:18.978s, but he was soon replaced on the top of the board as more drivers put their times in. Soon enough it was the two DS PENSKE drivers, Vergne and Vandoorne respectively, dropping the time down to 1:11s. The Envision drivers seemed to finally pick up a bit of pace, with Buemi in p7 and Cassidy in P4, but so far it seems to be a rocky road for the Jaguar powered cars.
We’ve momentarily had a yellow flag, with Ticktum running wide, but he was able to rejoin the session without any issues.
With the first ten minutes of the session done, it was Rast in P1, followed by his teammate Hughes, Fenestraz, Cassidy, Dennis, Buemi, Nato, Vandoorne and two Maseratis of Gunther and Mortara completing the Top 10 at that point of the free practice. The McLaren’s seem strong in Portland, with Rast already topping the charts in FP1, and now joined by his teammate in the second practice on the track in Portland. Will they be capable of transferring this performance into qualifying and race?
15 minutes down, and 15 minutes remaining, and it’s still the two McLaren’s holding a grip on the front of the field. They’ve been joined by two Nissan’s, with whom they shared a powertrain, and it seems that so far Portland has been quite suiting for the cars powered by the Japanese manufacturer. Porsche decided to join the conversation, with both Denis and Lotterer in the Top 10 during this stage of the session. The same can be said about the two Envisions, so it seems like Portland’s free practice has been dominated by the game of duets.
After that, most of the drivers found their way back to the pits, only to rejoin the track with a couple of minutes left on the clock.
With only five minutes remaining, it was Gunter in P1 with the time of 1:09.240s, followed by Rast, Vergne, Fenestraz, Hughes, Frijns, Wehrlein, Buemi, Da Costa and Di Grassi completing the Top 10. The remaining minutes of the session went without any disturbances, even though we’ve momentarily had a yellow flag again twice. It turned out to be Dennis who tried to avoid slower cars on track and then Cassidy running wide.
Here’s the final classification after the second and last free practice session in Portland:
