Durban - Another incident-packed hour saw the three official practice sessions held for the A1 Grand Prix of Nations, Durban, South Africa to a close ahead of this afternoon’s Qualifying.

As the A1 drivers continued to learn the track, there were plenty of spins and excitement as front wings were lost over curbs and cars headed into tyre walls. Five red flags were bought out after spins from A1 Teams Australia, Lebanon, Malaysia, Pakistan and Portugal but they were not the only ones to leave the track. Italy, the USA and Mexico all damaged their cars, with Mexico losing two front wings over the course of the session and Ireland and the Netherlands taking minor spins.

Following his incident on track, A1 Team Pakistan driver, Adam Khan, was airlifted to hospital for a precautionary CT scan after complaining of lower back pains.

Official Practice Session 3 (11.00 - 12.00)

A1 Team Driver Time No. Laps
1 Ireland Ralph Firman 1.19.535 22
2 Netherlands Jos Verstappen 1.19.814 24
3 Switzerland Neel Jani 1.19.957 22
4 France Alexandre Premat 1.20.132 20
5 Great Britain Robbie Kerr 1.20.306 21
6 Czech Republic Tomas Enge 1.20.472 23

7 Portugal Alvaro Parente 1.20.572 14
8 Canada Sean McIntosh 1.20.612 23
9 USA Philip Giebler 1.20.712 22
10 Italy Massimiliano Busnelli 1.20.889 21
11 South Africa Stephen Simpson 1.20.981 21
12 Germany Timo Scheider 1.21.054 22
13 New Zealand Matt Halliday 1.21.078 23
14 Malaysia Alex Yoong 1.21.185 15
15 Brazil Nelson Piquet Jr 1.21.235 22
16 Mexico David Martinez 1.21.408 21
17 Indonesia Ananda Mikola 1.21.593 17
18 Pakistan Adam Khan 1.22.135 17
19 Lebanon Basil Shaaban 1.22.138 17
20 Australia Will Davison 1.22.570 3
21 Austria Mathias Lauda 1.22.834 20
22 China Tengyi Jiang 1.23.262 21
23 India Armaan Ebrahim 1.23.645 21

Nominated drivers for Qualifying A1 Grand Prix of Nations, Durban, South Africa presented by Absa Sunday 29 January 2006

A1 Team A1 Driver
Australia Will Davison
Austria Mathias Lauda
Brazil Nelson Piquet Jr
Canada Sean McIntosh
China Tengyi Jiang
Czech Republic Tomas Enge
France Alexandre Premat
Germany Timo Scheider
Great Britain Robbie Kerr
India Armaan Ebrahim
Indonesia Ananda Mikola
Ireland Ralph Firman
Italy Massimiliano Busnelli
Lebanon Basil Shaaban
Malaysia Alex Yoong
Mexico David Martinez
Netherlands Jos Verstappen
New Zealand Matt Halliday
Pakistan Adam Khan
Portugal Alvaro Parente
South Africa Stephen Simpson
Switzerland Neel Jani
USA Philip Giebler

Qualifying consists of four 15 minute sessions with a 10 minute break between each. Only one driver per A1 Team is allowed to take part in Qualifying but that driver must have completed at least three timed laps in an Official Practice session. Each driver is limited to three laps - effectively one "flying lap" - per session and must record at least two times, an aggregate of which will determine that A1 Team’s position on the grid for Sunday’s Sprint race (20 laps). The grid for the Feature race (40 laps) will be determined by the outcome of the Sprint race.