Inside the opening 5 minutes, a red flag had to be thrown as Christian Rasmussen crashed at turn 10. The Dane had a snap in the mid-corner, lost the car and hit the tyres, initially with the rear and then the front. The back of the car was heavily damaged.
Kirkwood led Rasmussen, Herta, Ericsson, Simpson, Siegel, Rossi, Lundgaard, Ferrucci and Power before the session resumed.
Will Power, Christian Lundgaard and Marcus Armstrong all had moments in the opening 10 minutes but continued on.
At turn 11, Scott Dixon had a spin as the Kiwi had rear locking. He managed to get out of the gravel and continue on his way.
A second red flag was thrown inside the first 15 minutes as Sting Ray Robb lost the car at the top of the corkscrew and spun into the gravel.
Rossi, Rosenqvist, Palou, Kirkwood and Rasmussen was the top 5 at the 15-minutr mark.
Drivers continued to struggle on their used tyres as Power took a grip through the gravel at turn 3, with Grosjean getting wide at the bottom of the corkscrew.
With 15 minutes to go, a 1:08.2300 from Herta saw him lead Palou, O’Ward, McLaughlin, Rossi, Kirkwood, Armstrong, Rosenqvist, Ericsson and Rasmussen.
Kyffin Simpson was the next driver to cause a red flag, losing the car between turns 9 and 10, ending up beached in the gravel.
Powet, Dixon and Rosenqvist made late gains, jumping to P2, P6 and P7 respectively.
Luca Ghiotto took a trip through the gravel at turn 9 but carried on.
