How did I become an F1 driver?

Chapter 328 231: The dust has settled

Now Qin Miao only needs to stay in this position and finish the game, then he can bring a successful conclusion to the first season of his career.

It is worth mentioning that after reaching third place, Qin Miao's speed gradually increased because there were no other drivers blocking the front!

After two laps, the original 25-second time gap between him and Verstappen became 24.3 seconds.

Although Qin Miao's pursuit speed was slow, even if he ran at this pace, Qin Miao would not be able to catch up to Verstappen within 10 seconds before the end of the race.

But at least this shows that Qin Miao still has a speed advantage over Verstappen, and as Qin Miao gets faster and faster, the time gap between him and Perez behind him will gradually widen. By then, Qin Miao will have enough room for error, allowing Qin Miao, who has already half-footed the driver's championship podium, to take the final step more steadily.

Just when the race entered a calm period, and everyone thought the race would end like this while cruising, an accident occurred on the track.

When the broadcast camera cuts away, you can see another Alfa Romeo slowly decelerating on the track.

At this time, another Alfa Romeo driver, Kimi, has finished the last F1 Grand Prix of his career, so the only person driving this car at this time may be another Alfa Romeo driver: Giovinazzi .

Giovinazzi on the track parked his car on the exit line of T9 because there is a Matthew entrance next to this place.

But this happens to be the exit position of T9. Basically, as long as someone makes a mistake at the apex of T9, the car will spin.

Then the out-of-control car will definitely hit Giovinazzi's car.

Therefore, the tournament team dispatched the virtual safety car after a short period of consideration and judgment.

At this time, because the final result between Hamilton, Verstappen and Qin Miao has been determined, the now somewhat boring race has become full of doubts.

In the following time, the audience and commentators were speculating whether Verstappen would choose to pit, because at this time both Qin Miao and Hamilton had reached their most comfortable positions, and at this time Verstappen was The top is Hamilton, who won the race championship, and the bottom, Qin Miao, who won the driver's championship this season.

And he had nothing.

As the saying goes, those who are barefoot are not afraid of those who wear shoes. At this moment, only Verstappen can make some changes to disrupt the situation on the field, fish in troubled waters, and benefit from it.

So after Hamilton passed the pit entrance, Verstappen decisively chose to pit for tire changes.

Because it was a pit stop during the virtual safety car period, Verstappen not only got a new set of hard tires for this tire change, but also gained 9 seconds... If Hamilton and Qin Miao pitted...

As for Qin Miao, after Verstappen entered the pit area, Qin Miao took advantage of the situation and came to second place. Even because of the virtual safety car, Qin Miao was quickly shortening the time gap between himself and Hamilton in front.

When the virtual safety car ended, the time gap between Qin Miao and Hamilton was directly shortened from 30 seconds to 11 seconds.

Hamilton is at a loss.

First, Verstappen pitted early and gained a new set of tires, which also saved him 9 seconds of pit-changing time.

Now that his teammates are behind him again, all the advantages Hamilton gained in the early stages of the game were basically wiped out by unexpected situations on the track.

Of course, Hamilton also got good news, that is, his teammate Qin Miao is behind him, and with Qin Miao's tire protection and long-distance ability, if this game does not continue to appear like a safety car or a red flag In the event of such an accident, Qin Miao would have run the entire race directly on his set of hard tires.

Therefore, Hamilton felt that Qin Miao would most likely help him block Verstappen behind him.

And this is indeed the case.

On lap 40, Verstappen came behind Qin Miao.

Although Verstappen had the advantage in tires at this time, Red Bull found with some despair that all Verstappen could do at this time was to follow Qin Miao.

His speed is simply not enough for him to launch an attack on Qin Miao, and he can follow Qin Miao only because Verstappen's tires are newer than Qin Miao's, otherwise Verstappen would only be able to watch Qin Miao helplessly. The distance between Miao and herself is getting farther and farther.

At this time, Red Bull realized that Qin Miao had caught up with Verstappen or even surpassed Verstappen in terms of long-distance speed and other abilities.

But he has only been in F1 for one year!

After that, the situation on the field stabilized again.

Qin Miao and Verstappen were constantly chasing Hamilton in front, but because of Qin Miao, the pursuit speed was not very fast.

Verstappen could not find a chance to attack Qin Miao at all. Qin Miao seemed to have not seen the tap and late braking on the straight, and it did not affect Qin Miao's racing state at all.

If nothing unexpected happens, the race may end in this state.

Just when the audience once again felt that the game might return to calm, and they ran straight to the end of the game, another accident occurred on the field.

On lap 53, a big accident occurred on the track.

Latifi made a mistake when exiting the corner, and the car hit the track wall directly, and the car's butt stopped on the track. The front nose of the car was directly knocked off by Latifi, and carbon fiber fragments were scattered on the ground.

At the same time, also appearing in the broadcast screen was the yellow flag on the driver's ranking position on the left.

Because the position where Latifi crashed was too tricky, the virtual safety car could no longer handle the scene. Without the safety car, there was no way to clean up the debris left on the track after the car crashed.

Qin Miao had already settled down in this game, and he was already satisfied with his current position. After all, he had already won the annual driver championship, so he needed another bike.

But with the appearance of the safety car, Qin Miao had a more dangerous idea in his heart.

That is to pit and change to soft tires. After coming out, you may not only win the driver's championship this season, but also pocket the championship of this race.

This idea is extremely attractive to all top drivers in Qin Miao's position, because the feasibility is really high. After all, there were only a few laps left before the end of the race, and Qin Miao still had a brand new set of soft tires in his inventory.

So immediately after the safety car came out, Qin Miao asked French in the team TR: "Is there a safety car? Can I stop and change to soft tires?"

Mercedes' strategy team was also nervous because of Latifi's sudden crash on the track but started working without panic.

But the situation at this time is a bit passive for Mercedes-Benz.

Because the two Mercedes drivers are in front, if they pit and Red Bull's Verstappen and Perez do not pit, then both Qin Miao and Hamilton will have to pass Perez before they can attack Vesta Pan.

What if instead of pitting, Verstappen and Perez pitted for soft tires?

On the contrary, Red Bull is much more relaxed.

As mentioned before, Red Bull has nothing to lose at this time. They are like a drowning person at this time. If anything appears in front of them, they will grasp it like a life-saving straw. Don’t let go.

The safety car at this time is Red Bull's lifeline.

So as soon as the safety car appeared, Red Bull's strategy team decided to let Verstappen pit for a set of soft tires that had only run in Q1 in qualifying.

Not everyone is Qin Miao. Even if they are not used during the race, three different sets of brand new tires should be kept as spares.

Others have neither the ability nor the need.

But according to the position where Latifi crashed, even if it was a set of soft tires that ran a flying lap, after the safety car ended, the speed would still be much faster than the normal hard tires.

After a tense discussion with Frankie, it was Frankie who finally took the initiative and said to Qin Miao: "Qin Miao, we still focus on stability in this race. You must know that there is another person behind Verstappen." Perez, if you pit at this time, you will definitely get stuck behind Perez."

Qin Miao thought about it for a while and felt that what Franky said made sense, and finally gave up on this somewhat tempting idea.

You can fight for the race championship at any time, but the driver championship only comes once a year. If you miss it, you may regret it for the rest of your life.

After this, the Red Bull Racing team discovered that neither Mercedes driver had any intention of pitting.

After discovering Mercedes' idea, Perez no longer had the need to stay outside, so both Red Bull drivers chose to pit under the safety car and change to soft tires.

After Hamilton caught up with the safety car, Qin Miao came behind Hamilton soon after.

Behind Qin Miao was a slow McLaren, followed by two Alpines, a Ferrari, and finally the Aston Martin driven by Vettel, and behind Vettel was Verstappen.

Qin Miao and Verstappen were separated by five local trains.

It stands to reason that the FIA ​​needs to issue an order to untie the slow car at this time, but there are too many debris on the track. If the slow car is ordered to untie the car at this time, the slow car may go too fast due to chasing the car formation. Debris on the track caused a secondary accident.

So when the safety car was brought to the 55th lap, the race stewards not only did not issue an order to untie the slow car, but instead issued a statement stating that they would not untie the slow car.

Then it took a lot of time to clean up the wreckage of Russell's car.

In fact, this race could have been completed directly under the safety car.

However, the race stewards considered that this race is the last race in 21 after all, and the FIA ​​rules have clearly stated that if not necessary, it is best for the driver to take the lead in crossing the line on the last lap.

So Michael Massey, after briefly consulting with his colleagues, decided that the safety car would be withdrawn on the final lap.

As for the slow train, in fact, according to the instructions just issued by the FIA, there is no need to untie it.

But looking at the top three drivers, and thinking that this is the last race, the last lap is more or less suspenseful.

So at this time, Michael Massey was going to directly untie the five slow cars between Qin Miao and Verstappen, and then let Verstappen try to attack the two Mercedes drivers.

But after he has an idea, he has to discuss it with his colleagues.

However, after telling his colleagues his inner thoughts, the other two race stewards on duty directly vetoed Michael Massey's decision.

It's not because there's anything illegal about doing this, it's mainly because I just sent out a notice that it wouldn't be untied, and it was untied again. Isn't this a slap in the face out of thin air?

And with Qin Miao's defensive ability, what if Verstappen uses new soft tires? The most he can do is overtake Qin Miao. How can he still fight with Qin Miao when they both crash and retire?

If they really crashed and retired, wouldn't Hamilton win the championship?

This season has been exciting enough, so let’s not let him have any more surprises in the last lap.

So, forget it.

Although Qin Miao, a Chinese, won this year's F1 driver's championship, many relevant practitioners felt dissatisfied from the bottom of their hearts, but as mentioned before, it was better than Hamilton winning the final driver's championship.

So, finally on the 58th lap of the race, the safety car was withdrawn, and Hamilton did not push the car because he knew that there was only Qin Miao behind him, and Qin Miao was obviously not as fast as himself in this race.

Even if he pressed the car, Qin Miao couldn't catch up.

But at the same time, this also means that this season's driver's championship has little to do with Hamilton.

Hamilton himself also knows that he has no chance to win the driver's championship again, and he has no chance to create F1 history and surpass the status of car king Schumacher in F1.

At this moment, Hamilton wanted to say something, but the shadow of failure pressed overwhelmingly on him like the night tonight, giving him a momentary trance and a feeling of drowning and lack of oxygen. This feeling It almost made him speechless.

At this time, Hamilton was leading on the track. Although Hamilton would win the race championship after crossing the line, Hamilton was not happy at all. Instead, his heart was full of bitterness after failure.

Although he knew it was useless to think about it at this time, Hamilton still couldn't help but start to think. If from the beginning of this season, he would be more serious, make fewer mistakes, run more racing simulators, and spend more time on In terms of the development of the team’s car, will the results be different this season?

(End of this chapter)