Team France’s Loic Duval set the fastest times in the first two practice sessions at the A1 Grand Prix in Durban as Team South Africa did battle with a drive shaft that broke on Friday.
In scorching temperatures, Duval set a lap time of 1:19,36 at the morning practice session, and bettered that with a time of 1:18,62 in the afternoon session.
In the morning session, South Africa’s Adrian Zaugg set the 13th-fastest time, but only after the pit crew managed to repair a drive shaft that broke in his first lap of the day.
”In motor sport, things like that happen. Then I pushed a bit too much later, missed my braking and hit the wall, so we had to retire.”
Zaugg described the track as ”a bit bumpy”.
The afternoon practice session had to be cut short after when a portion of the track started breaking up at turn seven. Organisers were busy repairing the track later in the day in a bid to have it ready for Saturday’s qualifying session. — Sapa