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Formula E Marrakech: Da Costa tops practice, Vergne misses session

Antonio Felix da Costa topped opening practice for the Marrakech E-Prix, while his DS Techeetah team-mate and reigning Formula E champion Jean-Eric Vergne was forced to miss the session

Da Costa was one of only two drivers to post a 1m17s lap, edging points leader Mitch Evans by 0.103s to head the leaderboard on a 1m17.863s.

This season the Moroccan round adjusted its format to hold first practice on the Friday evening as opposed to the usual one-day FE timetable.

The change to the structure for the 2019-20 season follows the decision to bring forward the race start by an hour, which would have led to a morning first practice session running in low-light conditions.

With the changes to the schedule, Vergne was unable to contest the 45-minute run, having been sidelined with severe headaches.

In a tweet that has since been deleted, the DS Techeetah driver wrote that he was working with FIA medical staff to return for Saturday.

He was replaced in practice by the team's test driver James Rossiter.

A regular at the races this season, the Nissan Super GT driver ended the session 20th and 1.95s off his temporary team-mate da Costa.

Santiago E-Prix winner Maximilian Guenther rounded out the top three, 0.199s adrift of first place.

Nissan's Oliver Rowland was fourth ahead of early pacesetter Lucas di Grassi.

Sam Bird was sixth fastest for Envision Virgin Racing - posting a time 0.555s shy of da Costa - and enters the race with a 100% podium record in Marrakech.

Sebastien Buemi, who scored his first points finish of the season with third in Mexico City last time out, was seventh for Nissan ahead of Daniel Abt (Audi) and Jerome D'Ambrosio (Mahindra).

Bird's team-mate Robin Frijns edged Mahindra racer Pascal Wehrlein to complete the top 10 runners.

Mexico polesitter Andre Lotterer was only 12th fastest for Porsche ahead of Venturi's Edoardo Mortara and Alexander Sims.

Although the session ran with no interruption - other than the scheduled full-course yellow test run - BMW driver Sims did bring out a yellow flag when he ran deep into Turn 7 and was forced to reverse on the escape road.

Mercedes driver Stoffel Vandoorne was only 23rd fastest, having had a lap time deleted for missing the Turn 5/6 chicane.

He was still 2.127s ahead of slowest driver Ma Qinghua, driving for the NIO 333 team - which enters this weekend with a new team principal and executive director.

FP1 times

Pos Driver Team Car Gap
1 Antonio Felix da Costa DS Techeetah DS 1m17.863s
2 Mitch Evans Jaguar Jaguar 0.103s
3 Maximilian Guenther BMW BMW 0.199s
4 Oliver Rowland Nissan e.dams Nissan 0.448s
5 Lucas di Grassi Audi Audi 0.555s
6 Sam Bird Virgin Audi 0.558s
7 Sebastien Buemi Nissan e.dams Nissan 0.591s
8 Daniel Abt Audi Audi 0.606s
9 Jerome d'Ambrosio Mahindra Mahindra 0.674s
10 Robin Frijns Virgin Audi 0.691s
11 Pascal Wehrlein Mahindra Mahindra 0.854s
12 Andre Lotterer Porsche Porsche 0.949s
13 Edoardo Mortara Venturi Mercedes 1.171s
14 Alexander Sims BMW BMW 1.201s
15 James Calado Jaguar Jaguar 1.227s
16 Oliver Turvey NIO NIO 1.293s
17 Brendon Hartley Dragon Penske 1.293s
18 Nico Muller Dragon Penske 1.359s
19 Nyck de Vries Mercedes Mercedes 1.629s
20 James Rossiter DS Techeetah DS 1.950s
21 Felipe Massa Venturi Mercedes 1.956s
22 Neel Jani Porsche Porsche 2.127s
23 Stoffel Vandoorne Mercedes Mercedes 2.181s
24 Ma Qinghua NIO NIO 4.308s


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