How did I become an F1 driver?

Chapter 547-551: The Incredible Race Speed

During the time when Qin Miao was in the pit, Perez had been accelerating very hard, but unfortunately, the time gap was still a bit large, and Mercedes' tire change was not slack.

At the same time, everyone in the Red Bull team was expecting Qin Miao to make a mistake on the track.

But unfortunately, Mercedes not only did not make any mistakes when changing tires this time, but also performed a 2-second tire change that even Red Bull itself may not be able to achieve often.

Forget it, Qin Miao is in the lead, there is no fun at all now.

On the track, Qin Miao took the lead and ran two laps on the track, and Qin Miao's single lap result came out.

Just 0.3 seconds faster than Perez's lap time.

At the same time, Qin Miao's lap time was the same as Verstappen.

This is actually not good news.

Because it can be seen from this that Red Bull's car is still the Mars rover, and the lap time of a set of old hard tires that has run 25 laps on the track is actually the same as Qin Miao's.

If he had changed to a set of neutral tires, it would be hard to imagine how much faster his lap speed would be than Qin Miao.

The pace of the race on the track then gradually calmed down, with several top drivers running at their own pace on the track, and there were no major changes in positions.

The drivers at the back were evenly matched, especially in the fight for the points zone.

After all, the performance of the cars between the teams is very different this season.

It can be said that the top ten places are occupied by five teams with relatively competitive cars. It is indeed quite difficult for teams like Lynk & Co, Arrow, Williams and McLaren to score points in today's race.

If you want to get points, you will naturally fight more fiercely.

After a relatively calm period of racing, as the race reached the 39th lap, Verstappen finally pitted to change tires.

In fact, during this period, Red Bull was looking forward to the appearance of red flags or safety cars on the track.

Unfortunately, Red Bull didn't wait.

In the end they got Verstappen to pit at the time they had planned.

At this time, the gap between Verstappen and Qin Miao was slightly narrowed, and the time difference between the two was shortened to 15 seconds.

Assuming there is no mistake in changing the tires, Verstappen will be 5.5 seconds behind Qin Miao after coming out of the repair area.

Compared to the Mercedes team technicians who changed Qin Miao's tires.

At this time, the Red Bull team's technicians were under the most pressure, after all, the baton was finally passed to them.

Although Verstappen's position on the track is not entirely related to their tire change, it is also closely related to their tire change.

If they change the tires this time as perfectly as Mercedes did for Qin Miao, the time gap between Verstappen and Qin Miao will definitely be further narrowed. It is not impossible for him to be 4.1 seconds behind Qin Miao after coming out of the maintenance area.

This way Verstappen can save more time in pursuit.

But if the tire change is wrong, even if Verstappen changes to a new set of soft tires, and this set of soft tires allows Verstappen to run the remaining 18 laps, Verstappen is unlikely to catch up with Qin Miao.

Unfortunately, much to the disappointment of domestic audiences, the Red Bull team did not make any mistakes when changing tires this time.

Although not as impressive as the Mercedes team's tire change, a tire change of 2.2 seconds is definitely an excellent result of 80 points.

Being able to perform like this under high pressure is enough to show the strength of the Red Bull Racing team.

When Verstappen returned to the track again, he was 5.2 seconds away from Qin Miao in front of him.

Of course, this is just the prologue of today's game, and the game that the audience is really looking forward to has not yet begun.

As time went by, Verstappen came out of the pit area after changing tires and arrived at the 41st lap two laps later.

Verstappen ran an effective lap on the track, and the gap in lap results between him and Qin Miao also emerged.

Verstappen was 0.8 seconds faster than Qin Miao in a single lap.

Adding the 0.4 seconds gained in the lap just coming out of the maintenance area, the time gap between the two was only 4 seconds.

Not to mention the Mercedes team's strategy team, even Qin Miao himself was confused and astonished after seeing Verstappen's pursuit speed. How could Verstappen be so fast?
But Qin Miao was just a little surprised. After all, what really gave other drivers a headache was not his single lap speed, but Qin Miao's ability to protect the tire and his defensive ability.

Qin Miao was confident that even if Verstappen caught up to the DRS zone behind him, he could lock Verstappen directly on the track just like when he first entered F1.

Then use up the opponent's tires until their speed is slower than yours.

On the other side, in Red Bull's team TR, Verstappen's track engineer did not forget to remind Verstappen: "Max, keep up the current pace, we expect to catch up with Qin Miao in 4 laps."

It is worth mentioning that Verstappen was actually in a normal long-distance running state at this time. If he really pushed hard, he should be able to catch up with Qin Miao by one second per lap.

But this state will not last long. After about 2 to 3 laps, the speed will not be that fast.

Countless lessons have taught Red Bull that if too many tires are used up when chasing Qin Miao, then when you get behind Qin Miao, the large amount of tire durability lost during the pursuit process may be the main reason why you cannot surpass Qin Miao.

If you want to surpass Qin Miao on the track, you can't miss any details.

To be honest, Red Bull has summarized so many little tricks and details for chasing Qin Miao that they can fill up an entire regular-sized notebook.

Next, the dull atmosphere in the stadium was swept away, and the fans watching the game on the spot also followed the camera of the live director and kept an eye on Qin Miao and Verstappen on the track.

The time gap between the two people in the broadcast footage was rapidly decreasing at a speed visible to the naked eye.

Verstappen was basically getting closer to Qin Miao on every lap, and he shortened the time gap between himself and Qin Miao by at least 0.7 seconds on every lap.

In the end, as Verstappen's track engineer said, on the 4th lap four laps later, Verstappen was in T45 in the third timing section, and after exiting the corner from the braking point, he entered the DRS zone behind Qin Miao.

"Qin Miao, Verstappen has entered your DRS zone. It's your turn to perform." Although Qin Miao may have been paying attention to Verstappen behind him, Franky still reminded Qin Miao at the first time, and of course did not forget to encourage Qin Miao.

"understood."

Looking at the Red Bull car that caught up with him in just four laps, Qin Miao sucked his teeth and suddenly felt a little painful. Could he be unable to defend against this bastard?

Therefore, Qin Miao was not as confident as before when answering.

Verstappen, who caught up with Qin Miao, was not in a hurry and did not put too much pressure on Qin Miao on the track at the first time.

Instead, he followed Qin Miao for two laps, 0.5 seconds behind him.

That's right, although Verstappen had a terrifying 0.7 second single lap speed advantage, he seemed to have changed his personality in today's race. After catching up with Qin Miao, he did not make any excessive offensive moves except popping up in the inner lane at some emergency braking points to put some pressure on Qin Miao. But the less Verstappen moved behind him, the more anxious Qin Miao became.

Because this is seriously inconsistent with Qin Miao's understanding of Verstappen. Verstappen's personality is not like this.

Sometimes the unknown is the most frightening thing.

Because you don't know what Verstappen, who has suddenly changed his personality, will do behind you.

Just as Qin Miao was anxious and kept an eye on Verstappen's car, it was the 47th lap.

There are still 10 laps to go before the end of the race.

Verstappen finally took action against Qin Miao.

Even Verstappen's approach was very covert.

He shortened the time gap between himself and Qin Miao to 11 seconds at the T0.3 braking point in the second period.

This is actually not a problem. After all, during the laps following Qin Miao, the time gap between Verstappen and Qin Miao at the T11 braking point has always been maintained at 0.3.

Although Qin Miao still kept his attention on Verstappen at this time, he did not think that Verstappen would attack him at this time.

But in the first two laps, after entering the consecutive turns T12 and T13, the time gap between Verstappen and Qin Miao will gradually widen to 0.5.

This is normal, after all, the turbulence of the car will indeed affect the grip of the following car in these consecutive turns.

However, in this lap, after entering the next series of bends, the time gap between Verstappen and Qin Miao was still 0.3 seconds.

Qin Miao actually felt that Verstappen still wanted to take action in this lap, so Qin Miao strengthened his precautions. However, after putting himself in Verstappen's perspective, Qin Miao felt that the place where he was most likely to take action was the DRS area in the third timing period.

So Qin Miao didn't take it too seriously.

In addition, the consecutive turns in the second timing section are particularly easy to defend.

Even if you make a mistake, the car behind you will not be able to pose a substantial threat to you due to the width of the track.

But the cornering speed of these turns is related to whether you can create a wide enough distance from the car behind you in the following DRS zone.

Therefore, most drivers are very serious when running this section and focus on the line. After all, with the length and width of the cars in the current season, there is no possibility for the drivers behind you to overtake you in these corners. You don’t have to worry about the actions of the cars behind you, and the same is true for Qin Miao.

Therefore, when Qin Miao passed these consecutive turns, he ignored Verstappen behind him.

After exiting T15 and completing the entire multi-turn area, Qin Miao finally had time to glance at his rearview mirror.

Then Qin Miao saw Verstappen almost sticking to the back of his car.

To be honest, the moment Qin Miao saw this Red Bull racing car, he got goose bumps on his back.

Holy shit! How could this bastard be so close to me?

They are all top drivers, and the possibility of the car behind overtaking the car in front can basically be seen in the last corner before entering the DRS zone.

Qin Miao took a look at the position between Verstappen and himself and knew that if he continued to exit the corner at the current race pace, Verstappen would definitely overtake him in the DRS zone.

Although the distance between T15 and T16 is very short, Qin Miao also figured out how to defend Verstappen behind him during this time.

Qin Miao began to deliberately slow down the pace before entering the braking point of T16. As mentioned before, the track width of the last few corners of the second timing section is actually very narrow. Here, unless the car in front stops directly on the track, it is basically impossible to overtake.

So after Qin Miao slowed down, Verstappen had no choice but to slow down as well.

Otherwise he would run into Qin Miao.

Verstappen was even mentally prepared for Qin Miao to slow down his pace after he noticed his intention to attack.

So when Verstappen saw Qin Miao suddenly slow down his car, he just smiled slightly, but Verstappen's body and mind were all tense, waiting to see Qin Miao's moves on the track, ready to act when the opportunity arises.

Then Qin Miao made a mistake at the braking point of the T16 right-angle turn. When braking into the turn, a puff of white smoke came out of the right front wheel.

Although it was very short, it was obvious that Qin Miao's rhythm in cornering was a bit messy.

It also delayed his exit time.

Qin Miao's rhythm was disrupted, which normally would be good news for Verstappen who was about to exit the corner and enter the straight, but when Qin Miao made a mistake, he just blocked all of Verstappen's space for acceleration.

Even if Verstappen didn't slow down, he would definitely hit Qin Miao's car.

So even though Qin Miao's defense this time sacrificed a certain durability of his car's right front wheel, Verstappen looked at the white smoke coming out of the right front wheel of Qin Miao's car, and his years of racing experience made Verstappen subconsciously step on the brakes a little deeper.

But none of this surprised Verstappen, because he was mentally prepared to deal with all of Qin Miao's defensive moves.

Therefore, when Qin Miao came out of the corner, the time gap between Verstappen and Qin Miao was increased to 0.5 seconds again by Qin Miao's extreme braking, which was almost like walking on a tightrope.

Although it seemed that Qin Miao still had a chance to defend against Verstappen, Qin Miao sighed helplessly.

Because Qin Miao knew that he could no longer hold on.

And that was indeed the case. Verstappen didn't even give Qin Miao any chance to struggle. Before DRS was turned on, Verstappen used Qin Miao's wake to shorten the time gap between himself and Qin Miao to 0.3 seconds.

The reason why it was so fast was, on the one hand, because Verstappen had Qin Miao's wake, and on the other hand, because Verstappen had 90% battery power before leaving the corner.

Honda's engine is no longer GP2. Although its durability is still not as good as Mercedes' engine, in terms of horsepower, Honda's engine is not much behind Mercedes.

So as they entered the DRS zone, the time gap between Verstappen and Qin Miao began to narrow rapidly. Finally, in the middle of DRS, the finishing speeds of Qin Miao and Verstappen exceeded 335 kilometers per hour.

Qin Miao ran at 336 kilometers per hour and Verstappen ran at 346 kilometers per hour.

At this time, Qin Miao's acceleration began to slow down significantly, while Verstappen's speed was still increasing.

Seeing this scene, Qin Miao sighed and did not make any defensive moves, because with Qin Miao's experience he knew it the first time.

Under the influence of Verstappen's fast DRS tail speed, any defensive action he took would be futile, and would only waste his remaining tire space.

As a result, Verstappen finished side by side with Qin Miao on the inside line and completely surpassed Qin Miao before the braking point of T17.

And with the combined effect of light fuel, DRS, ERS and the wake of Qin Miao's car, Verstappen reached a final speed of 351 kilometers.

Directly broke the final speed record of the Miami Circuit.

(End of this chapter)