Edoardo Mortara topped the time sheets in Cape Town with a 1:09.700 in a disrupted Free Practice One session.
Overall, Maserati had a good session with Maximillian Gunther finishing the session in P7 as the Monaco-based team look to build some momentum after a difficult start to Gen3.
Jaguar had a promising session with both of their drivers making it into the top ten after their double DNF in Hyderabad. Sam Bird came home second while Mitch Evans finished the session tenth.
Teams struggled to get clean running in FP1 with the session being red-flagged twice.
The first stoppage came inside the first ten minutes with Sebastian Buemi involved in a nasty incident in his Envision.
The Swiss driver bottomed out through the sweeping turn nine, losing control of his car and hitting the wall in a side-on impact. The clean-up caused a stoppage to the session, leading to an extension by race control.
Once the session went green, Jake Dennis was forced back into the pits with a brake-by-wire issue, in another troublesome practice session for the Porsche Powered Andretti team.
The bumpy track plagued several cars with reliability issues and caused many others to consider set-up changes in the session.
Di Grassi also found himself in the service road at the turn five chicane with a broken suspension in the session. While home hero Kelvin van der Linde slowed through turn seven due to a loss of drive in his ABT Cupra.
Race control did not extend the session further after the recovery of van der Linde’s car, leaving the teams with just over six minutes to complete their run plans around this new circuit.
Times came tumbling towards the end of the session with consistent running beginning to clear the dusty track surface.
Rookie Sacha Fenestraz brought his Nissan home in P3 with teammate Norman Nato ending the session in ninth. The Japanese team struggled for pace at the start of Gen3, with their inexperienced drivers learning the new cars.
Fresh off of his inherited podium in Hyderabad, Antonio Felix da Costa was the only Porsche-powered car in the top ten, ending the session in fourth as he warms to the team.
NIO 333 showed their one-lap pace once again with both of their cars finishing the session in the top ten. Dan Ticktum ended the session fifth while teammate Sergio Sette Camara came home eighth.
Action returns tomorrow with Free Practice 2 starting at 09:05 local time.
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