TAG Heuer Porsche driver Antonio Felix da Costa was quickest in second practice for the Jeddah E-Prix, a session that featured two stoppages.
The first red flag came with 28 minutes of the 40-minute session remaining after Envision Racing’s Robin Frijns came to a stop at Turn 13 with his car going into a failure mode. After two attempted resets, he was able to get going again, but didn’t feature in the rest of the session with his car needing a motor change.
The second came in the final three minutes after Nyck de Vries, who was on a fast lap, collided with a slow Stoffel Vandoorne. The Mahindra driver shot up the inside of the Maserati MSG man at the Turn 4 hairpin then went into the wall, sustaining front wing damage. The session did not resume after the clash.
Da Costa’s 1m15.470s lap, which came with 14 minutes to go, was 0.379s quicker than Thursday night’s quickest time and 0.124s better than DS Penske’s Maximilian Guenther, who wound up second for DS Penske. Jake Hughes was the third quickest driver, ahead of the Nissans of Norman Nato and FP1 pacesetter Oliver Rowland as the Japanese brand continued to impress.
Edoardo Mortara was sixth-quickest in the other Mahindra, ahead of Andretti’s Nico Mueller and NEOM McLaren driver Sam Bird, with the second factory Porsche of Pascal Wehrlein and the customer Porsche-powered Cupra Kiro of David Beckmann rounding out the top 10.
Vandoorne and de Vries were 11th and 12th quickest before their collision, with Jean-Eric Vergne 13th for DS Penske, Zane Maloney (Lola Yamaha Abt), Dan Ticktum (Cupra Kiro), and Sebastien Buemi (Envision Racing) 14th through 16th respectively.
Taylor Barnard was 17th quickest for McLaren, ahead of Andretti’s Jake Dennis, who reported a return of the braking and balance issues that plagued his campaign last season.
Nick Cassidy and Mitch Evans – who didn’t set a time with the full 350 kW and four-wheel-drive – were 19th and 21st in a low-key session for Jaguar TCS Racing, the pair being split by Lucas di Grassi in the other Lola, while Frijns finished the session at the bottom of the times after his early exit from proceedings.
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