Jean-Eric Vergne broke his own track record by over four tenths as he once again showed brilliant pace in the new Techeetah.
Having gone fastest yesterday, Vergne is quickly setting himself out to be the man to beat, especially in terms of one lap pace.
Despite his good time though it wasn’t a perfect day for the Frenchman, as an off earlier in the day caused damage to one of his chassis.
Behind Vergne the competition also raised their game, as last year’s title challengers Renault e.dams and Audi Abt Schaeffler filled the next four positions.
Sebastien Buemi and Lucas di Grassi broke the old track record to second and third respectively, with Nico Prost and Daniel Abt behind them.
Mahindra Racing continued their impressive form with Nick Heidfeld going sixth fastest ahead of the improving DS Virgin Racings of Jose Maria Lopez and Sam Bird.
There was also a marked improvement from NextEV TCR, who after disappointing yesterday managed to show more encouraging form to finish ninth fastest with Oliver Turvey, and eleventh fastest with season one champion Nelson Piquet Jnr.
Suffering contrasting fortunes however were the new Jaguar team, who finished well down the order in fourteenth and seventeenth.
The team are expected to confirm Adam Carroll and Mitch Evans at the conclusion of the second test, but neither driver has shown the pace required to get towards the sharp end of the grid.
The only other team who had a worse day were Venturi, who seem to have slipped back from last season to end the session in sixteenth and eighteenth.
They don’t have long to turn around the situation either, with tomorrow being the last day of official testing before the season opener in Hong Kong at the beginning of October.
