How did I become an F1 driver?

After the qualifying round on Saturday, Zhou Guanyu naturally received a lot of attention.

He also participated in a live interview on Sky Sports after the game.

Of course, this is also a consistent tradition in the F1 paddock.

Everyone is used to it.

Soon, after a day, it was time for the main competition.

At the start, the on-site director did not focus on Zhou Guanyu. After all, everyone knew that it was an accidental event for Arrow's car to reach this position. Paying attention to the old man Verstappen and Qin Miao were the highlights of today's race.

Five red lights lit up and then went out, and the race officially began.

The two Mercedes drivers had a perfect start in today's race.

Both of them made no mistakes at the start and moved forward all the way to the braking point of T1.

Qin Miao relied on late braking on the inside and his advantage on the W1 straight to suppress Norris on the outside at T14, and surpassed Norris before T1.

After all, Qin Miao has the advantage of the inside line, and his late braking control accuracy is obviously higher than Norris. In addition, when exiting the corner, although Qin Miao left space for Norris, Norris obviously did not have as much courage as Verstappen and Hamilton, and he did not dare to cut in.

Therefore, at the start, Qin Miao moved up to third place and entered the podium area.

Just after Qin Miao passed T2T3 and made sure that his current position would not be threatened by anyone, Qin Miao looked back.

Zhou Guanyu, who was supposed to be in fifth place, had lost his car and it had been replaced by a Ferrari with Leclerc sitting in it.

?

Where is Zhou Guanyu?
Is he not going to faint again?
Actually.

Zhou Guanyu had no problem with his start in this game.

Even before the race started, Zhou Guanyu was confidently preparing to compete with Qin Miao on the track to see their reaction speed at the start.

Although Zhou Guanyu also knew the characteristics of the W14 muscle car, even if his reaction speed was faster than Qin Miao, when accelerating, Luo's C43 would be beaten to pieces by the W14 in seconds.

But you still don't allow people to try it?

What if it succeeds?

But I never expected it.

Arrow's car broke down at the most critical moment, and Zhou Guanyu's engine speed instantly dropped from 1 rpm to 6000 rpm at the start.

Even though Zhou Guanyu discovered something was wrong during this process and immediately stepped on the accelerator pedal deeper, it was of no use. The engine speed remained unchanged. After more than a second, Zhou Guanyu's car slowly started.

During the start of an F1 race, let alone being 1 second slower, even if you are half a second slower you will lose at least two positions.

Zhou Guanyu started more than a second late. Not to mention how much he lost position, Zhou Guanyu himself was also panicked.

After the race, the official explanation given by Arrow was: there was a problem with the braking system setting of Zhou Guanyu's car, which caused engine failure and ultimately destroyed Zhou Guanyu's start today.

To be honest, Zhou Guanyu's fans have become accustomed to Arrow's explanations. They might feel uncomfortable if there are no problems in the race one day.

Zhou Guanyu also lost such an excellent ranking in the qualifying stage due to a malfunction of the team's car. He was a little confused and out of control for a while.

After all, according to Zhou Guanyu's original plan, he had to at least come back with eighth place in this game.

But after such a shitty thing happened, it was difficult for Zhou Guanyu to remain calm.

As a result, Zhou Guanyu was affected and made a mistake when braking at T1. He first hit Ricciardo in front of him, and then used the force of Ricciardo to hit Gasly in front of him. Gasly was braking into a corner at this time, and the grip of the car was already at an extreme state. The balance of the car was completely broken by such a collision. Gasly also hit Ocon on his right.

Tire on tire, Ocon took off on the spot, outlasting his teammate Gasly.

In this accident, the ones who suffered the most damage were not Zhou Guanyu, the instigator, nor Ricciardo, the unlucky guy, but Ocon and Gasly.

Gasly's right rear wing was completely destroyed, the right rear tire burst, and Ocon's seat was broken into two pieces after being lifted up by Gasly and fell to the ground, making it impossible for him to continue driving on the track.

Ocon even injured his back, but it was not serious.

Because of this accident, the two Alpines retired from the race without even completing a single lap.

The word "miserable" is not enough to describe the current situation of Alpine.

It is a tragedy because in the last race in the UK, Alpine also had two cars retired.

But there is some good news. At least for Chinese car fans, the damage to Zhou Guanyu's car was not serious.

Ricciardo was also able to continue driving on the track.

Of course, although all this is understandable to Zhou Guanyu's fans, and even all the blame should be put on the Arrow team, the FIA's punishment of Zhou Guanyu is inevitable.

Zhou Guanyu was penalized 5 seconds in this race and had two points deducted from his super driver's license.

[Putting aside other factors, this missile does have some technology, using its own minor injuries to shoot the two away from a distance]

[I feel sad and funny at the same time, hahahahaha, I can’t hold it in anymore]

[This missile is really powerful, just like Tai Chi]

【Dongfeng 24】

[Quit like a lion]

[77: There is nothing left to teach]

【Zhou Guanyu: You are the one who won’t give me a seat at Renault, right? Get out!】

……

After this chaos, the game on the field returned to normal.

The subsequent games were relatively normal.

However, Qin Miao discovered something that surprised him. That is, after the Mercedes team brought in new upgrades during this Grand Prix weekend, his lap time on the track could barely match that of the upgraded Verstappen.

Although he doesn't have a huge speed advantage over Verstappen, at least he won't be left behind by Verstappen at a speed visible to the naked eye.

And after DRS was turned on, Qin Miao was able to pull ahead behind Verstappen in the DRS area on the starting straight.

Of course, that's all. In areas with more bends, Qin Miao still couldn't catch up with Verstappen. He could only give Verstappen some intensity and pressure on the straights and DRS areas.

But Qin Miao's speed created good conditions for the old man to set lap times.

After all, Qin Miao would suddenly appear behind Verstappen from time to time. Even if Verstappen didn't want to do that, most of his attention was still attracted to the back by Qin Miao.

As a result, the old man gradually widened the gap between him and Verstappen.

However, as time went on and the car became lighter, Verstappen's speed also increased.

When the old man saw Verstappen's speed increased, he pitted directly. This pit stop also pushed the pit stop window for the leading group.

And in such a relatively boring situation on the field, there will always be a heroic team with outstanding achievements standing out to make the audience laugh.

On the 18th lap, when Leclerc entered the pit to change tires, the left rear tire changing gun had an occasional malfunction. After replacing another one, Leclerc's tire was reinstalled, presenting a 9.4-second tire changing feast to all the Iron Buddha Temples.

[Self-penalty of five seconds]

[Tribute to the legendary Tai Chi master Zhou Guanyu, both of them are penalized 5 seconds]

[There's even time to take the tire off and take a look]

[No, Qin Miao is going to join such a team next season? ]

[I started to worry about Qin Miao’s future]

[How dare Qin Miao? Even if he can save the tire, he will have to spend the rest of his life in jail if he encounters a tire changer like this.]

……

In the subsequent race, there were not so many unexpected situations on the track, and the drivers were all running at their own pace on the track.

Although there were two pit stops and some drivers were undercut by the cars behind them due to the team's tire changing speed or other accidents, there was no change in the ranking of the top three drivers, even though they all made two pit stops.

Verstappen's speed in this race was actually quite good. In fact, if taken alone, Verstappen's long-distance single lap speed was more than 0.3 seconds faster than Mercedes' car.

But the problem was that Verstappen was sandwiched between two Mercedes cars, one in front and one behind. Although his teammate Perez caught up with Qin Miao in the later stages of the race, who was Qin Miao?
Perez is a recognized defensive master in the F1 paddock. Moreover, on the Hungaroring track, which is particularly difficult to overtake, Perez himself is not as good as Verstappen in controlling the RB19, a car that is basically not designed for driving comfort. After catching up with Qin Miao, Perez's race was over.

With Hamilton blocking the way ahead, when Verstappen wants to attack Hamilton, he also has to be on guard against Qin Miao behind him at all times, because once the attack on Hamilton fails, Qin Miao might really take advantage of the opportunity to squeeze you out of the blue. And on this kind of track where overtaking is particularly difficult, Verstappen must be too aware of how serious the consequences of being squeezed behind by Qin Miao are.

Perez, who was behind Qin Miao, could only follow behind Qin Miao at this time and could not even put much pressure on Qin Miao.

The four drivers were in a stalemate in the front, constantly putting pressure on each other and waiting for mistakes, but no one made a mistake at this time.

Then the stalemate lasted until the end of the game.

In the end, the old man crossed the finish line and got his first pole to win in the 2023 season.

When Hamilton crossed the finish line under the high pressure of Verstappen, the old man really cried with joy in the team TR.

Although the old man has won countless grand prix titles in his life, the honor of seven championships was really built up by winning one grand prix after another.

But the old man really felt that the Pole to win in today's race was more difficult and dangerous than any previous Pole to win in his career. Several times he was almost unable to withstand Verstappen's attack.

The feeling of returning to the spotlight made Hamilton deeply understand the meaning of the idiom "lost and regained" as Qin Miao said.

After the game, when Qin Miao got out of the car, the old man who had just got out of the car hugged Qin Miao tightly.

Hamilton himself knew that most of the credit went to Qin Miao for allowing him to face less pressure than Verstappen in this race.

In fact, Qin Miao didn't want to be the old man's wingman, but just like the problem Perez encountered behind him, Qin Miao in this race couldn't overtake Verstappen in front of him, and was very frustrated to be blocked by Verstappen for the entire race.

The instigator was even an old man.

Because the old man has been providing Verstappen with slipstream and DRS.

So Qin Miao had no choice but to serve as the old man's wingman in the game.

But looking at this game from another perspective, the points between first and second place are 25 and 18, which is 7 points.

The points difference between the second and third place are 18 and 15, which is only 3 points.

Therefore, letting the old man win a race championship will not have much impact on the competition between himself and Verstappen for the world championship. On the contrary, it is a good thing.

Anyway, with the old man's current ranking in the standings, unless he can perform like today in every remaining game to compete for the top three, it will be difficult for the old man to threaten his championship plan.

And the next track will not be as difficult to overtake as the Hungaroring.

However, no matter what the considerations behind it were, the game ended with a result that Qin Miao was not very satisfied with.

There was no need to talk about what happened during the game, so in response to the old man's thanks, Qin Miao smiled and hugged him and said, "Congratulations, Lewis. The victory of this game belongs to you. Let's celebrate now."

"Thank you." The old man also responded to Qin Miao sincerely.

After the race, the drivers' scores and rankings are as follows:
P1: Hamilton +26 (fastest lap)
P2: Verstappen +18
P3: Qin Miao +15
P4: Perez +12
P5: Norris +10
P6: Piastri +8
P7: Leclerc +6
P8: Sainz +4
P9: Alonso +2
P10: Stroll +1
If you observe carefully, you will find that the points are scored by drivers from five teams: Mercedes, Red Bull, McLaren, Ferrari and Aston Martin.

Aston Martin, which dominated the Earth Group at the beginning of the season, now has two drivers relegated to the entrance of the points zone.

Of course, at least compared to some teams, Aston Martin has had at least a brief rise this season.

The overall driver standings are as follows:

1: Max Verstappen: 250
2: Qin Miao: 215
3: Hamilton: 181
4: Perez: 127
5: Alonso: 103
6: Leclerc: 80
7: Sainz: 71
8: Norris: 44
9: Stroll: 39
10: Piastrid: 22
11: Ocon: 20
12: Gasly: ​​14
13: Albon: 8
14: Zhou Guanyu: 6
15: Hulkenberg: 6
16: Bottas: 4
17: Kakuda: 2
18: Magnussen: 1
The overall team standings are as follows:

1. Mercedes: 396
2. Red Bull: 377
3. Ferrari: 151
4. Aston Martin: 142
5. McLaren: 66
6.Alpine: 34
7. Alfa Romeo: 10
8. Williams: 8
9. Haas: 7
10. Lynk & Co: 2 (end of this chapter)