How did I become an F1 driver?

Chapter 255 Chapter 253: Too much is not enough (6K, 816 more updates)

During the first practice session on Friday, it was still raining in the sky. The good news is that the rain was not too heavy, just light showers, and it did not even rain in many areas on the track.

But because a rain cloud had just passed, the entire track was now wet.

The air conditions were similar to yesterday, the air temperature was 12 degrees, the track temperature was 16 degrees, and the air humidity was 90%.

This is not a suitable temperature for racing, and the data collected is not that useful. The good news is that according to the forecast of the weather department, it will rain in the next two days.

Although it was rainy today, there were many spectators attending the practice session. The grassland tickets were sold in the same manner as before the epidemic. From an aerial perspective, the grassland was full of RVs and tents.

However, the rain gradually stopped before practicing for too long, and because there were always cars running on the track, the traffic lanes on the track were completely dry in about 10 minutes.

Qin Miao also pitted and put on a new set of medium tires.

Sometimes the weather forecast is really messy. Qin Miao remembers that before getting in the car, the people from the meteorological department swore to herself that it would rain throughout the first and second practices.

But on the track, the rain stopped before two laps on a set of semi-wet tires.

The following practice sessions are all about calm conditions. Everyone is constantly refreshing their test results and testing the limits of their cars on this track.

Soon, at the end of practice, Qin Miao ran the fastest lap on a set of soft tires and won the first place after a rare practice.

The rhythm of the subsequent second practice was the same as that of the first practice. Qin Miao also helped the team obtain a lot of data. However, it is worth mentioning that everyone used dry-terrain tires in the first and second practice, so the running data were also the same. Data for dry tires.

However, the meteorological department said that it will definitely rain on Saturday and Sunday, and the data measured using dry tires today may not be useful in qualifying and the race.

But at least this is the case for other teams, and Qin Miao and Mercedes also said they could barely accept it.

At the end of the second practice, Qin Miao finally accepted an interview to wrap things up and got off work!
On Saturday, this time the weather service was right and the track was just as rainy as they said it would be.

The bad news is that there are local showers. On the track where there is little rain, you can run out of the driving line during the third practice. When the car passes by in the wet area, the water mist is raised up to four or five meters.

But at least according to the weather forecast, the rain will continue until the end of qualifying.

So the third practice becomes very important.

An hour later, Qin Miao finally chose a set of high downforce adjustments. Among the two sets of new rear wings, Qin Miao also chose the one with higher downforce.

At the same time, Qin Miao started a new set of engines and exhaust gearboxes. It can be said that Qin Miao's crew was aiming for the championship in this competition.

Is Qin Miaoyu not good at fighting?Then just replace him with a new engine and core power components, and use hardware to make up for this shortcoming.

Qualifying.

As soon as the qualifying session started, the rain in the afternoon became heavier, and the start time of qualifying was postponed.

The specific time to start depends mainly on when the rain becomes lighter.

But despite this, the audience was still full, and the lawn was full of tents and RVs.

While waiting for qualifying to start, drivers like Qin Miao naturally couldn't run around, so they could only stay in the team's P room.

During the period before the start of qualifying, Qin Miao was different from his teammate Hamilton. The old man directly put on his helmet and waited in the car, while Qin Miao was leisurely sitting in the seat specially prepared for drivers behind Toto. .

When the on-site director started looking for shots, he happened to see a photographer filming Qin Miao.

Because Qin Miao was ranked in the standings at this time, the on-site photographer deliberately found an angle. The camera captured Hamilton sitting in the car preparing, and also captured Qin Miao on the other side who was lowering his head and not knowing what he was doing.

The director just showed this scene.

At the same time, the photographer also raised his lens slightly, and it happened to be aimed at what Qin Miao was looking down at.

If you zoom in a little bit, you can see that Qin Miao is holding a red Switch...

This person is fishing again while working...

If Hamilton and Qin Miao were not in the same shot, no one would say anything if Qin Miao played games in his free time before the game started.

It even makes many people feel sympathetic to Qin Miao. After all, many people also want to relax and fish in their daily work and life.

But this picture happened to be placed with Qin Miao's teammate Hamilton. At this time, Qin Miao's teammate Hamilton was sitting in his car waiting for the game to restart.

I am afraid of comparison in everything, and now with the comparison of Qin Miao's teammate Hamilton, Qin Miao's behavior is somewhat unprofessional.

Some people even thought that Qin Miao was a little bit ahead of his teammates in the standings.

And even the car fans who wanted to help Qin Miao didn't have a good reason to refute at this time. After all, this picture was too impactful.

In fact, Qin Miao was still a little restrained at this time, because he used to play with his mobile phone while waiting for the start of the game, but because of using communication equipment during the game, he was fined 5000 euros by the team.

So at this time, Qin Miao changed his mobile phone to Switch.

This thing is not considered a communication device, right?
As for the rhythm you brought up in and outside the paddock because you played Switch during the competition?

Qin Miao didn't know it at all, and even if he knew it, he wouldn't care about these rhythms, because as long as Qin Miao performs well enough in a game and wins one or two championships, these stains on his body will automatically be ignored.

And this is just a small fishing trip during work. It is not a matter of principle, nor is it even a stain.

Qin Miao is still confident in his own strength. Although this week's Spa is a bit difficult, there are still half a season of games ahead.

Ten minutes later, the FIA ​​reminded each team that according to the weather department's report, the rain had begun to lighten up, and the teams could choose tires and go on the track to prepare for lap times.

Qin Miao handed his Switch to Barber as soon as he received the notification, quickly put on the equipment and returned to his car.

According to the Mercedes weather department, it will rain throughout the qualifying session, so all drivers will have to use rain tires during the race.

However, the number of wet tires in a qualifying weekend is limited. Qin Miao had already used one set of semi-wet tires and one set of full wet tires during the practice session. Now he only has three sets of semi-wet tires and two sets of full wet tires left. Rain tires.

The key is that it may rain in tomorrow's race, so the only tires Qin Miao can use in the qualifying stage are two sets of semi-rain tires and one set of full rain tires.

Therefore, in the Q1 stage, Qin Miao planned to use full wet tires when he went on the track.

On the one hand, using full rain tires is to see how fast the full rain tires are. If the speed is not bad, relying on the performance advantage of the Mercedes-Benz racing car, you can directly run the entire Q1 stage with full rain tires, which can be regarded as saving tires.

But if the speed is not fast enough, the full rain tires can also drain some water on the track to prepare for changing to semi-rain tires after pitting.

However, after all, Mercedes has the background of a big team, so when Q1 just started, neither Mercedes, Red Bull or Ferrari stayed in the P room and did not move.

The main thing is to see the speed of these riders who came out of the P room first.

After the other drivers ran a lap, Mercedes also released the two drivers.

Qin Miao and his teammate Hamilton both used full wet tires.

After the tire warm-up lap started, Qin Miao clearly felt that there was too much water on this track, the driving lane was not dry, and the drainage of the wet tires was not very clean.

As soon as Qin Miao started his flying lap, Latifi, who was wearing semi-wet tires in the second timing period, rushed into the grass buffer zone.

If the team had released Qin Miao five seconds earlier, Qin Miao's performance in this lap would have been ruined.

After the first flying lap, Qin Miao's time came to 2:11, temporarily ranking third, not even faster than Russell, who was wearing semi-wet tires.

At the beginning of today's race, Russell started running on semi-wet tires. At the same time, his teammate Latifi also used semi-wet tires.

It's just that Russell, using semi-wet tires, reached first place after completing the first flying lap, while Latifi ran into the buffer zone before completing the first flying lap.

Because the durability of rain tires is stronger than that of dry tires, after completing the first flying lap, you can still run the second and third flying laps.

And when running the second flying lap, Russell, who was using semi-wet tires, directly improved the time to 2 minutes and 02 seconds in his second flying lap.

Compared with the second-placed Qin Miao, who was wearing full-weather tires, the time was improved by a full 9 seconds.

It is not difficult to understand that such a terrifying improvement can be achieved. After all, all drivers are using full wet tires on the track at this time.

The floor of the racing car itself has a strong adsorption force and will suck up the water on the track, coupled with the drainage function of the racing tires.

As long as it doesn't rain, after all the drivers run around the track, the track's grip will increase by at least 20%.

Because of this, Russell’s results using semi-wet tires were so incredible.

After understanding this, Qin Miao had just completed his second flying lap and when he was ranked sixth, he also heard the voice from the team's TR: "BOX, BOX, let's put on semi-wet tires."

After hearing the team's instructions, Qin Miao knew that it would be difficult for him in the race.

In Q2 or the race, I need to use the old semi-wet tires for at least one session.

However, Qin Miao got another piece of bad news just after he came out of the maintenance area, that is, the rain will get heavier in 3 minutes.

So in order to get another chance to run a flying lap before the rain fell, Qin Miao ran the tire warm-up lap directly as a flying lap after coming out.

Finally, it started to rain when Qin Miao’s flight circle reached the second timing section.

The good news is that there are twenty cars running on the track at this time, and apart from being a little wet, there is no water accumulation on the driving line, so the speed of the semi-wet tires is still very impressive.

At 3 minutes, Qin Miao completed his first effective flying lap on semi-wet tires. The final time was 1 minute 59.02.Coming to fourth for now.

And after completing this flying lap, Qin Miao started charging again, preparing to charge a full circle of electricity before running the last flying lap.

With 20 seconds left at the end of the game, Qin Miao crossed the finish line and began his final flight lap in the Q1 stage.

Soon, after completing the flying lap, Qin Miao's ranking rose to seventh, advancing to Q2 at a satisfactory position.

After all, it’s Q1, so it’s enough to advance.

The five drivers finally eliminated in the Q1 stage were: Giovinazzi, Tsunoda, Mick Schumacher, Kimi, and Mazepin.

Surprisingly, Williams advanced to Q2 today with two cars.

In Q2, Qin Miao used semi-rain tires, but Qin Miao used the same set of old semi-rain tires used in Q1.

There is no way, it has been raining these days, and there are not enough semi-wet tires. If you want to have new semi-wet tires for the race and Q3, you have to overcome it in Q2.

Qin Miao and Hamilton were the first to go out.

But just as they went out, the team's weather department said it would rain in 5 minutes, and that the rain would last until the end of Q2.

After a brief discussion by the team's strategy team, it was finally decided to recall both Mercedes drivers from the track.

And just put on a brand new set of semi-weather tires to make the final decision once and for all.

Stop running after the rain falls to protect the durability of this set of semi-rain tires.

After completing the first flying lap after the pit stop, Hamilton made a mistake, so he immediately let go of the first flying lap, while Qin Miao was slightly better. After completing the first flying lap, the time was 1 minute and 57 seconds. 3, the position came to second.

Not long after running this result, it really started to rain again, just as the team's meteorological department said.

However, when Qin Miao asked the team if he wanted to pit to protect his tires, the team directly said: "No need to pit, the rain will stop soon, continue to advance on the track."

The weather report is random.

It seems that the team is ready to give up Qin Miao's use of new semi-wet tires in the race. However, with Qin Miao's ability to protect tires, it is not impossible to use a new set of semi-wet tires in the race. Use old tires as new.

In the final stage of Q2, all drivers set new speeds on the track where the track conditions gradually improved.

In the end, Qin Miao advanced to Q3 in fifth place, while his teammate Hamilton was second.

The drivers eliminated in Q2 are: Leclerc, Latifi, Sainz, Alonso and Stroll.

In addition to the surprise that both Williams cars advanced to Q2 in this game, it was also surprising that neither Ferrari driver in Q2 entered Q3.

At the same time, Norris ranked first in both Q1 and Q2 in this game and advanced to the next round.

And his teammate Ricciardo was 6 places ahead of him in the qualifying stage. It can be said that Norris pushed his teammate to the ground and rubbed him.

Q2 had just finished stopping the clock, and after the drivers of each team returned to the garage, a heavy rain fell.

And from the weather map, we can see that this rain not only has no sign of getting smaller, but is getting heavier.

At the same time, the wind speed also increased to 10 kilometers per hour.

This adds more uncertainty to the already slippery Spa track.

The good news is that with such heavy rain, basically all the drivers will not use semi-wet tires after going out, because the rain now is heavier than at the beginning of Q1.

Moreover, during the period between Q2 and Q3, the rainwater that had been drained by the racing cars accumulated on the track again.

In the Q3 stage, the first driver to come out was Norris.

Norris was in great form in this race. It was obvious that Norris wanted to continue his performance in Q3 and Q1 in Q2. He took advantage of the fact that top drivers such as Qin Miao, Hamilton, and Verstappen did not perform so well on rainy days. A pole position in hand.

Halfway through Norris's warm-up lap, Vettel said in the team's TR: The rain was too heavy and the race should have a red flag.

The current amount of rain should indeed raise a red flag, but for some reason, the tournament did not do so.

And because Norris was the first to go out in Q3 at the beginning, he didn't need to run the first flying lap. He would get results after passing the warm-up lap.

If this red flag lasts for a long time, then the subsequent races may not be carried out directly, and everyone will be ranked according to the Q2 ranking. Then Norris will get the first pole position of his career here.

It may be cruel to say it, but Norris has been racing in F1 for so long, and the best starting position in his career is only second.

In contrast, Qin Miao won the first pole position of his career at Silverstone.

This gold content is not low at all. You must know that Silverstone is Qin Miao's teammate and Hamilton's home stadium.

Winning pole position on your teammate's home track is no small feat.

Although there is no enmity between Qin Miao and Norris, they even have a good relationship because they can often play games together when they have nothing to do.

But just because the relationship between the two is pretty good, Norris saw that Qin Miao, who entered the paddock two years later than him, had better grades and performance than himself. It was impossible to say that he was not jealous that Qin Miao had a good car. .

And now he finally has the opportunity to beat Qin Miao by one point in the qualifying stage, and he can even step on both Hamilton and Verstappen at his feet, and break his new career record.

Norris's foot on the accelerator was a little stronger than before.

So even though he already had results after the warm-up lap, he did not choose to pit, but started his first flying lap in Q3.

T1 was quite stable when cornering. After exiting the corner, Norris slightly straightened his steering wheel, and there was basically no loss of speed.

Finally, full throttle went straight to the El Rog corner.

Just when everyone thought Norris would continue his amazing performance in Q1 and Q2, the camera turned.

A McLaren that originally entered the El Rogge corner smoothly turned into a spinning top when exiting the corner.

All four wheel suspensions at the front and rear of the car were damaged by the impact and were hanging down on the car, spinning and sliding along with the car.

Debris was scattered all over the ground, and the metal parts rubbed against the ground, creating dazzling sparks. Naturally, the racing team immediately raised a red flag.

Under the rain, no one knew what had just happened to Norris.

In fact, with the current amount of rainfall, the race should have raised a red flag long ago, but the red flag only appeared after Norris's crash.

If the red flag had been set slightly earlier, even if the organizer really wanted Norris to get the pole position for this race, it would have been okay to give him the red flag after he finished the warm-up lap.

But now, everyone can only see everyone in the P room of the McLaren team holding their heads with their hands and looking in disbelief at the replay of Norris's crash.

Qin Miao and Hamilton were originally preparing to go out, but as soon as a red flag appeared, the small computer in front of Qin Miao was replaced by the Mercedes staff with the scene of Norris's car accident.

Fortunately, when the camera cuts to Norris again, you can see that the entire Norris racing car is still intact, and neither the monocoque nor the roll cage is damaged.

During this period, Vettel, who had just passed the pit entrance behind Norris and found a red flag, naturally couldn't run anymore, and he couldn't just drive back to the pit area, so he had to run around the track again.

When he arrived at the wreckage of Norris' car, Vettel stopped the car to check on Norris.

After confirming that Norris's helmet was still moving, that the person should be fine, and that he responded to his actions, he didn't stay where he was and drove away.

Shortly after Vettel left, the medical vehicle also arrived.

When the race meeting gives a replay of Norris's accident, everyone can clearly see that when Norris went uphill, the El Rog Bend was full of water flowing downwards.

And the normal driving lanes are all covered with water.

When Norris went uphill into T2, the car still had grip, but when the right front wheel of T3 hit the shoulder of T3, the car immediately lost control.

The grip of the right front wheel was lost instantly.

After the grip of the right front wheel is lost, the car will naturally veer to the right.

After Norris discovered that the front of the car veered to the right, he chose to correct it by turning left on the spot.

It's a pity that F1 drivers like Norris, who have strong car control, cannot completely predict how much correction the car will make in rainy conditions, and when to return to the steering wheel.

So by the time Norris realized that he had overcorrected and wanted to turn the steering wheel, the car had completely veered to the right and lost control.

Then he hit the wall on the side of the track, spinning crazily and sliding forward under the influence of the inertia of the car.

The good news is that despite a violent collision, Norris was not injured and even got out of the car on his own initiative.

After the red flag, Qin Miao stopped staying in the car, got out of the car, and took the initiative to get into the medical vehicle.

Qin Miao and other drivers from the team waited for more than half an hour during the red flag period.

This half hour was not too difficult for Qin Miao, who brought a game console to the paddock.

Half an hour later, Matthew on the track had cleaned up the debris scattered after Norris's crash, and the barrier he hit had been restored to its original state.

(End of this chapter)