F1: Absolute Car Feel

Chapter 296 Team Relationships
Once Wu Shi stabilized his lead, Vettel in the starting lap posed no threat to him, and he began to accelerate and widen the gap.

Sure enough, the soft tires performed much better than the ultra-soft tires; the temperature did not rise too quickly, and they could maintain high load pressure for a longer period of time.

sieve!
Lap 24, 1 minute 27.499 seconds.

This is indeed a normal speed that Mercedes soft tires can achieve during cruising.

Hamilton also set a similar lap time while chasing Verstappen, but he was still trailing behind Verstappen.

On this lap, his speed was slowed down to 1 minute 31.474 seconds!

The huge loss almost cost Hamilton the game.

Fortunately, Verstappen finally pitted on lap 25, allowing the veteran to get some fresh air.

But now Ferrari still has Kimi and Vettel as rivals ahead.

"Kimi is pitting, the gap between you and Sebastian is 5.3," Bono informed Hamilton.

“My tires are still overheating,” Hamilton continued.

“It will be alright,” Bono said.

From lap 26 onwards, the entire race became boring.

Can Hamilton catch up to Vettel even slightly?

The answer is no. He still needs to constantly overcome the various effects of insufficient grip, which causes his lap times to fluctuate, and he will gradually fall behind.

However, Wu Shi, who was leading the pack, did not seem to be bothered by this problem and maintained a steady lap time to control the distance between himself and Vettel.

This naturally caught the attention of Mercedes' engineering team. The race brought a lot of data, and they had to consider the cause of the tire overheating.

On lap 44, Wu Shi started using a slower car, and his lap time dropped slightly.

Vettel, who was behind, seized the opportunity to get into the 1-second zone, but Wu Shi immediately widened the gap after passing the slower car.

It was a race with only one stop to begin with, and now that the slow cars have passed, there are no more changes behind them.

On lap 57, Wu Shi crossed the finish line 2.7 seconds ahead of Vettel!
Mercedes cheered, as Ferrari's formidable competitiveness truly put pressure on them.

Fortunately, Wu Shi did not let the championship slip away from them.

Jonathan congratulated him on TR, and Wu Shi responded.

The celebrations on the champion's side were rather subdued, while Ferrari's side was exchanging long, drawn-out messages.

The team was simply praising Vettel's good form.

Vettel then began to describe it as a good start, saying that this race was very close to winning, and that it could have been.

Wu Shi parked his race car behind the number 1 sign, got out, and hugged those who had come to congratulate him.

When Vettel, driving a Ferrari, pulled up behind them, the cheers from the sidelines immediately drowned out theirs.

"That's how Ferrari always is."

Hamilton took off his helmet and came over to speak to Wu Shi.

"Indeed, hahaha, they'll be very happy for any reason that's good enough."

Wu Shi responded with a smile, "Iron Buddha Temple, it's all about doing what you can today. As long as you're on the podium, whether you're a big winner or a small winner, it's all the same."

"How did you do that?" Hamilton asked again.

"What?" Wu Shi asked in confusion.

"Around laps 16 and 17, with so many slower cars ahead of you, didn't you overheat when you were being stopped?" Hamilton asked.

“Of course it’s overheated, but it’s still under control, isn’t it?” Wu Shi said.

"Back then, the grip was terribly low, but you had plenty of confidence."

Hamilton spoke, but his mind was elsewhere.

Wu Shi shook his head and said, "You can maintain the speed; you just arrived at the station earlier."

After saying this, both of them fell silent.

Clearly, both of them had unseen secrets regarding team strategy.

Hamilton touched his chin, because he entered the pit early, and Verstappen blocked him for a full 7 laps after he came out!
Except for the first two laps where he took advantage of the new soft tires, his speed was slowed down to around 1 minute and 30 seconds due to Verstappen.

From this perspective, it might be better not to enter the station at all.

"Our strategy is differentiated."

Hamilton eventually said those words.

"."

Wu Shi did not answer this question.

Once in the lounge, everyone watched the replay together, and Vettel generously shared their strategy with the two men:
"We are waiting for you to arrive at the station. Our tire wear is not a big problem."

“Then why not enter the station undercut earlier?” Wu Shi asked.

He and Hamilton both realized at the same time why Mercedes made the old man pit after 18 laps; they were worried about Vettel undercutting.

"That's too early, it's impossible. Didn't Lewis get blocked by Verstappen?"

As he spoke, Vettel spread his hands, looking at the two of them strangely.

At that moment, a voice rang out from the podium outside. Hamilton patted Wu Shi on the shoulder and walked outside.

Next up was Vettel, who was greeted with an amazing cheer as soon as he stepped out.

Wu Shi was the last to leave, and he saw that the Iron Buddha Temple had once again forced their way into the closed area of ​​the race track to celebrate.

As expected of Volkswagen, they can drive fans crazy as long as they show even the slightest possibility of competing for the championship.

No other team can do that, which explains why Vettel “recited” the “head-tilting Bible” after the Canadian Grand Prix last year.

Wu Shi was already familiar with the award ceremony. The Australian Grand Prix trophy was still the same kind of "satellite dish" with a trident-shaped protrusion in the middle.

He held the trophy high in front of the crowd, and the cheers were decent, but not nearly as loud as those for Vettel.

Then, the FOM reporter who came up was "Captain" Weber.

Webber has been away from F1 for some time now. After winning the WEC championship in 2015, he seems to have gradually withdrawn from the driver's field and started to be active in various races as an interviewer.

“Wu Shi, congratulations on your first victory in the 2017 Grand Prix, and also your first victory since joining Mercedes. It’s a great start, isn’t it?” Webber said.

"Yes, I am very happy to be on the podium again. It is an honor for every driver."

“This year’s race wasn’t easy to win. Lewis and I both experienced tire overheating to varying degrees, but fortunately I managed to overcome these problems in the end,” Wu Shi said.

Webber chuckled upon hearing this. "We" encountered a problem, and "I" overcame it. "Quite the talkative young man." He then continued, "Well, when you came out of the first stop, you were blocked by Kimi, and it was very likely that you would have been overtaken by Sebastian."

"Yes, that was the most thrilling part of the whole race, our tires overheated, especially when we were behind dirty air."

"When I learned that I had to overtake Kimi, I told myself that I only had half a lap left. If I didn't overtake him by half a lap, I would probably be stuck here forever, and that would ruin the race."

"So from then on, I was thinking about what bends lay ahead and what actions I needed to take to help me overtake him."

"Fortunately, I did it in the end. After overtaking Kimi, I successfully passed the pit exit before Vettel returned to the track," Wu Shi recounted his experience.

“Oh! That was a great battle. I saw you constantly hinting to Kimi from turn 13 that you wanted to get inside, which is why he relaxed his defense at the center line later, giving you an opportunity.”

As a former F1 driver, Webber's insight is naturally sharp, and he spoke clearly.

"Yes, that's right."

Wu Shi responded that overtaking on the Albert Park circuit is indeed quite difficult.

Otherwise, why couldn't Rosberg get past him in 2015?
After finishing his interview with Wu Shi, Weber turned to Vettel.

These two were former rivals, but once they left the hunting grounds, their conflict naturally dissipated.

Vettel appeared very happy during the interview, considering his performance throughout 2016 was terribly lackluster.

Although he didn't win the championship this year, he managed to keep his old rival Hamilton behind him, which is enough to prove that the powerful Vettel is back!

“The past few months have been really intense, and it’s been hard to get into the rhythm. This is just the beginning, and tough work awaits us,” Vettel concluded.

Weber then looked at Hamilton:
"Lewis, you finished third, you should have had a chance to win, but your pit stop on lap 17 was a disaster. What happened?"

Hamilton took the microphone, thought for a moment, and said:

"I don't think there would have been a better outcome even if we hadn't entered the station at that time."

“My tires were always overheating, and I couldn’t get Vettel out of the way; he was always right behind me.”

"After encountering slower vehicles, my tires overheated even more, lacked grip, and slipped many times."

"Supersoft doesn't seem to suit us, and the team's strategic considerations are correct."

The old man also sorted out his thoughts. From the perspective of maximizing the team's interests, the team had indeed made the right choice.

After the interviews concluded, Mercedes held an internal Grand Prix debriefing meeting.

As with previous meetings, the different engineers discussed the situation, problems encountered, and current advantages of this competition.

Wu Shi listened attentively; there was a wealth of useful information here, which could very well be the direction for the future tuning and development of racing cars.

In the end, he figured out why Hamilton had to pit even though he was behind Verstappen.

Mercedes' strategy team believed that with the ultrasoft tires performing so poorly, other teams would definitely pit early to switch to soft tires.

But I never expected Verstappen to make it to lap 25!
In their original plan, Verstappen should pit a few laps later, and Hamilton would be greeted with clean air.

In clean air, the soft tires overheat very slowly, so Hamilton can keep up with the pace.

This way, they can maintain their lead over Vettel while preventing Vettel from getting an undercut first.

This strategy is based entirely on Mercedes' belief that ultrasoft tires are not good enough, and that soft tires have a more obvious advantage.

Unfortunately, in the end, this strategy turned out to be wrong.

However, that's not the most crucial point. The most crucial point is, if you're worried about Vettel's undercut, why not discuss this issue with Wu Shi?

Even though Hamilton complained the most and made a visible mistake, Wu Shi also complained about the tires overheating.

If Verstappen had entered the pit earlier, Hamilton would have been very likely to undercut Wu Shi, since the difference in seconds between the two before entering the pit was only a little over 2 seconds.

The new soft tire has a clean air speed of 1 minute and 27 seconds, which is much faster than the old supersoft tire's 1 minute and 28 seconds!

This pointed question was raised by Jonathan—who himself only learned of these things now.

This caused a momentary silence in the meeting.

Toto, with a serious expression and a furrowed brow, said:

"Ferrari is fast, and we will probably face huge challenges this year. Strategic differences are necessary. Since we have two cars, we should deal with Ferrari as if we had two cars."

"Kimi is executing Ferrari's strategy very well, and I hope we can do the same. We don't need to just focus on our two drivers."

Clearly, Jonathan's question cannot be answered directly.

It's fortunate that Wu Shi won this match; if Hamilton had won, things wouldn't be so quiet now.

However, Jonathan still said, "I think we should have a certain right to know about the strategy."

This statement clearly criticizes the strategy team for informing Jonathan Hamilton that he was pitting because the car was overheating and out of control.

The strategy team didn't even mention that Verstappen might also enter the game immediately.

Instead, after being blocked by Verstappen, he tried to make amends by saying that Hamilton only pitted because of his tires, otherwise why would he make a fool of himself by being blocked by Verstappen?
"."

The room fell silent again until Wu Shi spoke:
"Teamwork and teamwork are very important. Since we don't have a number 1 or number 2 driver, we can be transparent when making strategies. Otherwise, why would we hide our strategy plans?"

The other Mercedes engineers remained silent, but Wu Shi was able to speak in this setting entirely because of the confidence he gained from being a world champion for 15 years.

If he didn't have this world champion, his words would have been enough to provoke a backlash from the entire team.

“I also believe that a complete and harmonious internal relationship is very important,” Dudley began.

As an engineer for the Rosberg crew in 2014 and 2015, the Hamilton crew in 2016, and the Wu Shi crew in 2017, he also had his own ideas.

What did Hamilton say after Rosberg won the championship last year?

Hamilton believed it was due to the change of train crew.

What does this mean? Does it mean that their team can't produce a world champion?
Wherever they go, that driver can't win the world championship?

Toto looked rather grim; he realized there were many problems.

The three-year struggle between Hamilton and Rosberg not only strained the relationship between the drivers, but also caused internal conflicts within the team.

If the new driver is unable to compete with Hamilton, then without a doubt, this contradiction will not be apparent.

The problem is that Wu Shi, the youngest world champion, has now joined the team and is a driver who has proven himself with his skills.

"We'll discuss this in the next meeting. Let's summarize the other issues that arose during the Grand Prix first. Vehicle performance will be a priority in our discussion," Toto said, changing the subject.

But anyone with a discerning eye knows that even with Rosberg gone and Wu Shi in, the internal struggles will continue.

Wu Shi glanced at Jonathan. Why would Dudley stand up for him?

(End of this chapter)