Jean-Eric Vergne tops messy Rome practice

Vergne stormed to the top with seconds remaining on the clock as drivers set about their fast laps inside the last few minutes following an early red flag, a full-course yellow and a yellow flag.

The faster times were set in the second session but representative times were only achieved after an early red flag caused by Dragon Racing's Jose Maria Lopez locking up and hitting the wall at the tight Turn 17, damaging the front of his car and his right-front tyre.

Venturi's Felipe Massa then disrupted the session with a suspected driveshaft issue after he spun on entry into the sweeping Turn 13 and reported a loss of drive.

Initially, a yellow flag was called, allowing Envision Virgin Racing's Robin Frijns to go top with a 1m30.710s after the first session had three drivers lap inside the 1m29s barrier.

When the session returned to green a spectacular lap by Jerome D'Ambrosio, capped by a sizeable jump at the Turn 8 bump, sent him to the top with a 1m30.545s lap.

Then a rotating cast of drivers took turns at the top slot, including BMW Andretti's Alexander Sims - after a slight touch with the wall at Turn 16 - and his team-mate Antonio Felix da Costa.

Lucas di Grassi then spun his Audi machine in the final minutes, but it was not enough to prevent Vergne going top.

A flurry of improvements meant Da Costa was second ahead of Nissan e.dams Sebastien Buemi, who mustered third after an average second sector in the last minute.

That meant he nudged team-mate Oliver Rowland in fourth. The British driver had topped the uneventful first practice.

Fifth went the way of Jaguar's Mitch Evans ahead of Andre Lotterer and Sam Bird.

Sims would eventually end the session in eighth ahead of Abt and D'Ambrosio.

Jaguar debutant Alexander Lynn's first true experience on the Gen2 car came in practice and he finished both sessions in 21st.

Dragon's Maximilian Gunther is also returning to FE this weekend and was 20th in the first session before improving to 13th in the second.