José-Maria Lopez was the fastest in the first free-practice session in his home town of Buenos Aires ahead of Jean-Eric Vergne – the quickest on a 170 kw lap- and Mitch Evans. The session was interrupted twice by Antonio Felix Da Costa.
The weather conditions were rather cloudy and, as it had rained overnight, some damp patches remained on track.
The Renault e.dams were the first cars to head out on track, followed by the Audi Abt for a 45-minute session. José Maria Lopez was the first driver to set a significant laptime in 1:13.3 but the times kept improving as the track was being cleaned out by cars. Nelson Piquet Jr showed quite impressive pace in the early stages of the session, being the first one to get down to 1:11.0.
Jérôme D’Ambrosio, the man holding the lap record, went through some troubles with his racing instructions. With 30 minutes left on the clock, Piquet was still leading ahead of Nick Heidfeld and Lopez. Antonio Felix Da Costa was testing race limits and eventually managed to save the rear from the wall but one lap later, he carried on too much speed on turn 6 and hit the barrier. That accident led to a red flag with 27 minutes remaining. During the red flag moment, Piquet was leading from Frijns and Da Costa himself.
The session restarted with 18 minutes left on the clock. Rosenqvist was the first driver to go faster than Piquet after the red flag before Sam Bird went even quicker with a 1:10.3. Jean-Eric Vergne, who could not have a clean lap before in the session went straight to second position. Adam Caroll was the first driver to get a 200kw lap but it’s Lopez who got a significant lap in 1:09.4 ahead of Vergne, who was not on a 200kw lap, and Evans.
Da Costa stopped his second car in the middle of the road with eight minutes to go, deploying a yellow flag and then a red flag which ended the session. José-Maria Lopez finished the session the fastest ahead of Jean-Eric Vergne and Mitch Evans. Buemi, Bird, Rosenqvist, Prost, Heidfeld Di Grassi and Turvey completed the top 10.
