F1: The Making of a Racing God

Chapter 183 King of Brawl
"It was Max, and Hamilton too, they had a minor collision."

"Could this cause the yellow flag to be scraped?"

"Uh, you should be able to see it in a little while."

This collision not only triggered a yellow flag, but a yellow flag that required the deployment of a safety car and lasted for an extremely long time.

On the next lap, when Shu Long passed by turns 1 and 2, he saw this extremely dramatic scene. It was so classic that it could be sculpted into a statue and enshrined with a little artistic embellishment. Just by looking at the shape, he could roughly guess what had just happened.

Both cars were thrown out of Turn 2. The upper part of the Mercedes car was completely smashed, and even the T-shaped roll cage was knocked off.

Verstappen's Red Bull No. 1 bike almost rode the entire bike up there, and now half of its tire is still stuck on the Mercedes HALO frame.

"Did they fight with race cars?"

This description isn't entirely accurate. Judging from the situation at the time, Verstappen was first hit by the road shoulder, and then, after taking off, he hit Hamilton as well.

We should be thankful that HALO racks have been mandatory on race cars since 2018; otherwise, judging by this setup, Verstappen's rear wheel might have run over Hamilton's head.
May Bianchi find solace in heaven.

After checking on the two people and learning that no one was injured, Shu Long's mood didn't improve at all. He was furious when he saw the cars in front of him.

"Now, can someone tell me how I should compete next?"

"Keep it up! Now you can focus all your energy on your own game!"

What the hell is this?! Is this even human language?!

Shu Long understood what René meant: he wanted to tell him that he didn't need to worry about the other team in the upcoming races, and he didn't even need to pay attention to Hamilton's position.

But is there any possibility?
We were originally in P1! Where have you put us now?!

The good news is that because of this yellow flag, the time difference that Shulong was behind due to the tire change that took more than 7 seconds has been made up.

The bad news was that he had just changed his tire when the yellow flag appeared, and he was in P8 after exiting the station, while there were still many people ahead of him who had not yet entered the station!

It's not entirely true that they got a free pit stop, but coincidentally, the accident happened after Shulong exited the pit, meaning that the cars ahead also missed this pit stop window.

On the second lap, a large number of cars gradually entered the lane, including Sainz and the two Alpine cars, which returned to the back of Shulong, as well as Bottas.
Um?and many more!

"What's Bottas doing here?"

What else can René say? Mercedes cars are fast, of course!
Bottas already had a significant lead in speed on the Monza circuit. Even though he started from P17 today, the nearly 30-lap race was more than enough time for him to catch up to P6, and he was only one Sainz away from Shulong.

Moreover, given Ferrari's competitiveness at this race, Sainz probably won't be able to stop Bottas for more than a few laps.

In other words, if Shu Long cannot find a way to break through as soon as possible, or use his opponents to disrupt the situation, he will soon face the counterattack of Mercedes, who ruthlessly left him 2.7 seconds behind yesterday.

Where's the strategy team? Please help!

Today, Will Courtney is in charge of strategy at Red Bull. His abilities are beyond question. If it weren't for the series of tire change mistakes and this sudden yellow flag incident, Red Bull's series of judgments just now would have been perfectly sound.

The only problem is that something went wrong.

During the time the yellow flag was circling, Shu Long suddenly remembered that the FIA ​​had issued a new technical instruction regarding pit stops before the race. At the time, he didn't pay much attention to it because it didn't seem to concern the drivers, but now that he thinks about it, it might really be this part that caused the problem.

Previously, the confirmation of the tire change process at the station mainly relied on three sensors: one photocell each for the left front wheel, the right front wheel, and the center of the vehicle. When all the nuts were replaced, the jack was lowered, and the sensors were unobstructed, the system would automatically turn green.

However, the new technical instructions require the tire changer to press a confirmation button after changing the tire. As the world's top racing technology team, it is hard to believe that someone would be so stupid as to make a mistake with Verstappen and then continue to act foolishly with Shulong.

In other words, the hastily produced system from Red Bull probably has some problems, or the signal transmission of the buttons is faulty.

So Shulong simply shared his thoughts with Reni.

".is that so?"

"Let's discuss this in detail after the game; it's not the right time to talk about it now."

But if Shulong could think of it, how could they not have guessed it? Mercedes should even have been affected by this technical instruction.

Verstappen's incredibly long tire change of 11.1 seconds should have completely missed Hamilton's chance. Red Bull had almost accepted that Mercedes would pull back two points in this game, but then Hamilton also had a bizarre tire change of 4.2 seconds.

If Mercedes hadn't also underperformed, Hamilton wouldn't have run into Verstappen when leaving the station, and the two wouldn't have gotten into a fight over position. Naturally, there wouldn't have been the story of Hamilton pushing Verstappen onto the shoulder first, and then being retaliated against on the spot.

The current situation, with both cars retiring, is probably the best Red Bull could hope for after the 11.1-second tire change. At least Max is now leading Hamilton by one point in the sprint race.

However, this matter is also not suitable to be discussed in TR. The cause of the accident is still under investigation by the organizers. It would be interesting to take the blame for this incident.

Red Bull just wants to change the subject quickly, but the strategy team can't think of a good way to deal with Mercedes in a short time. However, they still informed Shu Long through Reni about some details that are currently worth paying attention to on the field.

"Also note that Leclerc is currently located at P2. Perhaps we can find a way to utilize him?"

"Ferrari?"

Where there are unlucky people, there are also lucky ones.

Many of the cars that were originally in front of Shulong did indeed return to their positions after pitting, but perhaps the home team's luck favored a certain Ferrari prince, Leclerc, who was clearly an exception.

Shulong ran several laps to try and catch the window in front of Sainz. So Ricciardo, who was originally behind Shulong, would naturally only appear behind Sainz after entering the pit. Not to mention Leclerc, who was more than 9 seconds in front of Sainz.

When an accident occurs during a race, a temporary yellow flag for that section will be triggered first. Once the race organizers quickly confirm the severity of the accident, they will either cancel the flag or convert it to a full yellow flag for that section, depending on the circumstances.

Everyone, including Ricciardo, was affected by the yellow flag in the first section, but Leclerc, who had become the de facto leader, was missed.

Although they didn't get a free lead position, getting promoted from P6 to P2 was still incredibly lucky.

However, for Ferrari, which is even less competitive than Toro Rosso in both single laps and long runs this weekend, being in a position that doesn't belong to them might not necessarily be a good thing.

The race restarted on lap 31. Ricciardo had just started to accelerate in P1 when Norris used the slipstream to overtake Leclerc on the starting straight.

Holy crap! How the hell am I supposed to overtake them later?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not talking about Ferrari, but McLaren, who's even more of a rocket than Mercedes at this race.

According to telemetry data analysis, Alfa Romeo had the fastest top speed at Monza this year, but their speed in low, medium, and high-speed corners was among the lowest in the entire race.

McLaren is second only to Alfa Romeo in straight-line speed, Mercedes is third, and Red Bull is fourth.

However, Red Bull performed much better than McLaren in low-speed and high-speed corners, which are precisely where drivers' handling and attention to detail are most tested. This gave Shu Long and Verstappen the opportunity to overtake McLaren in qualifying based on their individual abilities.

The same applies to the race itself; the three teams, Red Bull, McLaren, and Mercedes, form a closed-loop ecosystem of mutual support and restraint.

Shulong can rely on the characteristics of the Red Bull car to maintain his lead in Monza's numerous low-speed chicane deceleration combinations and high-speed corners, leaving ample room for defense so that he won't be overwhelmed by McLaren's DRS.

McLaren was outmatched by the combined strength of Red Bull and Shullon, yet they were the only team that could truly challenge Mercedes.

Shu Long has yet to defend against Mercedes, but he was 2.7 seconds behind Bottas in sprint qualifying, and he doesn't want to gamble on it in the race.

Furthermore, how can a Mercedes, which can't even get past a McLaren with DRS, compete with a Red Bull whose top speed is even slower than a Mercedes?
They'll take it one step at a time. Right now, Shulong's most pressing task is to find a way to get Lock & Lock to cause trouble for Bottas.

At the beginning, everyone had DRS, and it was difficult for Leclerc to break away from the train for a while. However, on the 4th lap after the race restarted, which was lap 35, Leclerc was thrown out of the DRS range by McLaren.

Sainz, behind Shulong, fared even worse; he couldn't keep up with the pack on the second lap and was mercilessly overtaken by Bottas on the previous lap.

However, according to data provided by René to Shulong, the lap times of McLaren and Mercedes on white tires were not ideal, which may be related to the current drop in track temperature. Their tire temperature seemed to rise very slowly under low downpressure conditions.

Ironically, Red Bull, whose overall aerodynamic design results in slightly higher downforce, is currently in excellent form. This is an opportunity!

Having raced for over two years, Shu Long seems to have had very few opportunities to battle with Leclerc for various reasons. As a teammate who often took the top two spots in F2, he does miss that feeling a little.

But it's too weak!
This year, Ferrari is clearly still reeling from the engine cheating scandal. Without the drag of the DRS at the front, Leclerc driving the Ferrari was as powerless as a sheep pinned down by a tiger.

However, Shu Long was not in a hurry to overtake Leclerc. At that speed, he doubted whether Leclerc could stop the Mercedes for a lap.

So before officially waving goodbye, Shulong decided to fully exploit Ferrari's value in their home arena!

Lap 36.

On the starting straight, the driver who had sucked in the Ferrari's wake simply activated DRS but didn't press the full discharge overtaking button. Instead, he waited until Bottas behind him caught up before starting to dart to the side.

The gap was simply too large. Leclerc barely made any defensive moves, and he could only watch helplessly as Shu Long climbed over the defense when the DRS zone was only three-quarters of the way across.

According to the normal script, Shu Long, who has already completed the overtaking maneuver, should now return to the racing line to ensure his speed when entering and exiting turns 1 and 2.

But someone did the opposite; he not only stayed on the inside line, but also made a late and heavy brake.

"Hey—!"

The front wheels locked slightly, emitting two plumes of hot white smoke, instantly giving Leclerc and Bottas the feeling that they had an opportunity.

Turns 1 and 2 require very precise control of the entry speed. If a mistake like locking up occurs, excessive entry speed will cause the car to understeer excessively and completely disrupt the engine speed and gear shifting rhythm.

In other words, even if the Chicane combination corner is too narrow and not convenient for attacking, as long as they can stay close, they can still overtake on the straights later by relying on better cornering efficiency.

So Leclerc also applied the brakes late on the outside, in order to get past Shulong who was blocking the inside.

Bottas followed suit, pulling to the inside and applying a late brake, trying to gain an advantage in the S-curve exit line by switching from the inside to the outside before Leclerc could.

As a result, the front wheel's grip only lasted for a brief moment, and it regained traction almost at the same time the two people behind it made corresponding movements.

He cut into the apex of the corner close to the sloping shoulder, and at the same time, he used the lower entry speed to straighten the car more quickly. With a light tap of the accelerator, he pushed the car in front of and behind Leclerc and started tracking again.

At this moment, the continuous curves were completely blocked by Shulong's shrewd maneuver.

The dragon not only interrupted Locke's weight transfer process, leaving him no time to adjust the car's direction, but also made the angle of entering Turn 2 extremely awkward.

He also used Leclerc and the rear of his car to block Bottas, making Mercedes' dynamics very uncomfortable before entering Turn 1.

However, the culprit didn't care about this or that; the marks left by Verstappen and Hamilton on the nearby gravel buffer zone were still there, and he didn't want to repeat the same mistake.

Although his own cornering rhythm wasn't exactly comfortable either, having taken the initiative in the cornering line, he had already positioned his car at the correct exit angle, letting Ferrari and Mercedes continue their battle in the corner while he stepped on the gas and sped away.

As the only Red Bull car currently on the track, the entire Red Bull team crew has their eyes on Shu Long.

Before the broadcast could even rewind and replay the scene, it captured the Red Bull pit crew jumping up and crowding around the screen, staring wide-eyed at the car's live feed, as if the benches were on fire.

If it's just a single straight DRS turn, Shulong might only be able to gain a lead of a fraction of a second over Ferrari at most.

However, by tricking the two into a corner and blocking them, the lead over the car behind was immediately reduced to 1.13 seconds after the corner, and taking advantage of their constant fighting, the lead was extended to 1.76 seconds after turn six.

In the same spot, one couple withdrew from the competition, seemingly determined to fight to the death, while the other lured the child in, closed the door, and beat him up.

The director was quite mischievous, giving Verstappen and Hamilton a close-up of their expressions at that moment.

The two players reacted rather calmly to this scene. Hamilton simply crossed his arms, smiled, and shook his head, while Verstappen just clapped along with the team while holding a water bottle in his mouth.

It wasn't that the two of them deliberately avoided creating a good effect for the show.

However, in the limited number of close matches, Shu Long's peculiar control strategy had left a deep impression on Hamilton, who also studied Shu Long's match videos extensively afterward.

Verstappen and Shu Long often meet up online to run IRACing together, and he's long been used to Shu Long's mischievous behavior.

Unlike Verstappen, Shu Long doesn't really care about his account's win rate or his score in the game. Instead, he prefers to engage in unconventional combat that he wouldn't be able to do in real life.

Collisions are inevitable, and minor mistakes often lead to early retirement from the race.

So after briefly reaching 8300 points with a win rate of 84% around 19, he messed around and got himself down to around 6000 points.

It is often said that those who understand you best are not your closest relatives or friends, but rather your rivals who truly value you.

Regardless of how they learned about Shulong, when this cunning little rascal locked his front wheel, others might have subconsciously thought it was a mistake, but Hamilton and Verstappen were already prepared to watch the show.

After enjoying the show, I have a bit of a headache. Leclerc and Bottas were unlucky again today; who knows if it'll be my turn in the next match?
The commentators were still analyzing the replay and concluded that Shulong was indeed very lucky this time; a slight mistake could have resulted in losing two positions.

Meanwhile, someone had already pushed hard while McLaren's lap times hadn't yet picked up, and by lap 39, he had closed the gap between him and Norris from 2.3 seconds to 0.9 seconds.

Besides the tire temperature issue, Norris, who has been exposed to the polluted air of Ricardo, has also been significantly affected.

On lap 40, he narrowed the gap to 0.4 seconds thanks to DRS before Ascari corner, but he just couldn't turn around or overtake. In order to open up the braking point, Norris pulled ahead by 0.63 seconds.

However, the 8th, 9th and 10th corners are a series of high-speed S-curves. Red Bull's high-speed cornering performance is already better than McLaren's. In addition, the tires of the Shulong were in significantly better condition at this time. After the three corners, the gap was narrowed to 0.37.

At this moment, the two cars were basically connected front to back, leaving Shulong with few opportunities. The Monza, with its full throttle at over 75%, already puts considerable pressure on the power unit, and this kind of high-intensity exhaust suction is an ultimate test of the engine's load.

After Turn 10 is a 1-kilometer-long straight at full throttle, but there is no DRS zone here.

McLaren’s terrifying speed advantage was on full display, and the dragon that had already taken full sludge was actually pulled a little further away.

However, the opportunity to overtake is not here, or even in any DRS zone.

Turn 11 after the straight, which is the last corner of the Monza circuit, is called Parabolica in Italian, which means parabola.

As its name suggests, the curve of the bend gradually decreases as you exit it, and the race car also follows the arc of a parabola as it slowly rolls outward.

However, McLaren's tires at this moment were not in a condition to withstand such a large lateral inertia while maintaining the car's speed and rear stability. Throttle input in the corners could only be done slowly and cautiously based on feeling.

Shulong has been waiting for this opportunity!

By braking 5 meters earlier, around 55 meters, and with lighter braking, Norris was able to enter the apex of the corner earlier. Caught off guard, Norris had no choice but to give up the fight and instead tried to counterattack using the faster cornering speed on the outside.

With the right strategy, Norris successfully maintained his positional advantage, barely leading Shulong by half a car length.

The problem is that he had already passed the DRS detection line before entering Turn 11, which means that in the current semi-parallel situation, Norris will have a DRS advantage over Shulong on the subsequent starting straight.

After all, he started F1 a year earlier than you, even if it was only one race earlier, but you're still too green, Nobo!
With almost no trouble, Shulong overtook the McLaren behind him. Once the game entered the defensive phase, he was able to steadily suppress the McLaren's performance by relying on the characteristics of Red Bull.

Moreover, with Ricciardo's slipstream ahead, even the difference in top speed was partially compensated.

With a McLaren in the background, Shulong no longer needs to worry about the threat posed by Mercedes-Benz Bottas.

Unfortunately, the McLaren's tire temperature gradually rose after that, and Ricciardo's lap time returned to normal. His performance was exceptionally stable, and it was clear that Red Bull could not overtake a car that even Mercedes could not outrun with its DRS.

After the next ten laps, there were no other opportunities, and Shulong could only finish in P2.

but
"Can anyone tell me when Daniel last won a championship?"

(End of this chapter)