The start of Formula E's fifth season of competition has been delayed, with the first practice session of the Ad Diriyah E-Prix being cancelled due to adverse weather conditions.
Commencing at 07:00 local time, the opening practice session of the weekend was delayed by 20 minutes due to heavy rain before the 45-minute long session was later cancelled, leaving teams with zero running using higher power modes ahead of second practice.
"Rain in the desert. That's definitely not what I was expecting coming to Riyadh," said Venturi Formula E Team Principal Susie Wolff following the cancellation of the session.
"That brings extra challenges now because we've lost a session and we've lost valuable track time. The rain is still pretty hard so it's going to be interesting to know when that's going to clear up.
"We do know from the weather forecast that it is due to clear up so we should get out eventually.
"I think predominantly, obviously here, you want to get a baseline with the car set up but most important is that the drivers learn the track because this is a very challenging track.
"It's new to all of the drivers. Obviously, we have Felipe [Massa] in the car who is also new to Formula E so there was a lot of information we wanted to gather in FP1 but it's the same for all of the teams so as long as we're all in the same boat it means we're all facing the same challenge.
"We had a small [software] problem on Felipe's car [in shakedown] but better it happen yesterday than today. Both drivers loved the track and said that it's very challenging and are looking forward to today obviously.
"We just need to get a bit more running to be a little bit more prepared for qualifying."
As a result of the cancellation of the session, FP2 will get underway 30 minutes earlier than initially planned, commencing at 08:35 am local time, meaning that teams will only lose 15 minutes of running as a result.
Qualifying for the opening race of the 2018/19 season will commence at 10:50 am where the starting order for the Ad Diriyah E-Prix will be determined.
