F1: The Making of a Racing God

Chapter 228 The light of the white moonlight comes from the sun
"This is so painful, guys! Where are we now?"

"At P3, it's okay, that was a great lap."

"That lap you just ran was like hell! Do you know what it feels like to run with your hands tied? So where's Max?"

"He's still pushing. Oh P4, you're 0.075 seconds slower."

Needless to say, those two in front are definitely Ferraris!

How big is the gap between us?

"."

"Dude, you know I'm going back to the pit room to change the tire later, right? I can actually check it myself."

René covered his forehead, took a deep breath, and turned to look at Horner beside him.

However, Horner was also busy, and Lambias was currently racking his brains to appease Verstappen, urgently discussing his next words in the team's private channel.

"Should we let them push? But our engine power is tuned conservatively, and the risk of competing with Ferrari for pole position is just too great!"

Hannah, the only woman at the Red Bull Pit Wall, and strategy director Will shared similar opinions. Red Bull's main strategy for this race was to prioritize long runs in the main race. Based on calculations from previous practice sessions, their average lap time was about 0.12 seconds ahead of Ferrari.

Putting aside Shulong's extremely powerful starting ability and Verstappen's highly aggressive driving style, even if they are blocked by two Ferraris and cannot directly overtake on the track, they can still try to improve their position by changing their strategy.

It is an objective fact that there are disadvantages in the race car, and the team's primary task is to control the losses as much as possible.

The budget cap for the new season has been further reduced, with each team having a limit of $1.4 million for operations and R&D. Especially in the early stages of the new regulations, the amount of effective resources that can be invested in R&D may even determine a team's competitiveness until the next regulatory cycle.

Therefore, the kind of car damage that Mick suffered in Q2, which was worth at least a million dollars, is absolutely unacceptable for any ambitious team.

Your car is already slower than others, and at this critical moment you have to spend important R&D funds to repair it. The leading teams must be laughing all the way to the bank!
As the team principal in charge of the team's operations and management, Horner also had to consider these practical issues.

But
"Come on! We're Red Bull! Don't forget what our logo represents!"

what?
I'll pay you, you'll risk your life.
Indeed, Red Bull has always been perceived as a group of reckless brutes. When did the phrase "challenging limits" become a concept that requires them to think ahead and behind?
"Let them do what they're supposed to do."

This message was immediately relayed to the driver and team's TR channel, and Shu Long, who was pitting to change tires, could hardly believe his ears.

"Sorry, sorry, I might have had some ringing in my ears just now. Did you guys say that?"

"If you ask again about the car damage from this race, you'll have to pay for the repairs yourselves!"

"Haha~copy!"

Shu Long gave Horner a thumbs-up as he turned to look at him, then parked in the parking space and waited for the mechanics to lift him up with jacks and slowly push him back into the pit room.

Verstappen followed closely behind.

The drivers cannot communicate directly with each other, so neither of them knows what their teammate said in the TR.

In the brief moment when their eyes met through their helmets, Verstappen felt as if he were being suppressed by a volcano, which was excitedly spewing seemingly friendly lava bubbles, while the heat wave and stinging skin constantly warned him of the other's terrifying destructive power.

"Bring me a track map, and also print out the brake and throttle curves from earlier."

"It's all ready. Whose do you want?"

"mine!"

This is Verstappen's answer: what he needs to do in this race is not to beat his teammate, but to challenge Ferrari for pole position when the car is already at a disadvantage.

But ultimately, Verstappen felt that his first challenge was to challenge himself.

Based on the test feedback over the past two days, Verstappen has always preferred a rear wing kit with moderate to low downforce, but being outpaced by Leclerc in the second practice session forced the team to adopt a more conservative strategy.

This may be the most reasonable choice for the team at present, but it is definitely not an acceptable choice for any driver who is pursuing the "fastest".

Sometimes, beyond a so-called championship, it's better to honestly ask yourself what kind of mindset you had when you chose to entrust your life to the steering wheel.

Are you unwilling?

Every detail of the track was already firmly imprinted in his mind. Just by looking at the data curves, Verstappen could quickly make a judgment on where there was still room for improvement. Thinking of this, he couldn't help but chuckle softly inside his helmet.

That's definitely something to be unwilling to accept!

Why was he so fast?

For so many years, this has been a question that almost every one of Verstappen's teammates has had. Even with the team's almost completely transparent data and the daily research and analysis of the vehicle, they could only watch in despair as the other's figure receded into the distance.

Before this, Verstappen had only experienced the same confusion that Ricardo had in his first year with Red Bull.

But he learned, he grew, and he quickly defeated Ricardo.

But now this sense of confusion seems to have returned.

He could see where his data could be improved, and even understand why Shulong was sometimes faster than him. But when he was actually on the track and entered the world of lightning speed, he couldn't do every key point he had memorized perfectly.

So this is what it feels like to have talent that can't keep up with talent.
Shu Long had no idea how complicated his teammate's feelings were. In fact, he didn't seem to be thinking about anything at all; he just closed his eyes and leaned against the race car as if he were asleep.

"Don't we need to look at the data again?"

“I remember everything. If you hadn’t interrupted me, the lap I was simulating in my head might have gone much more smoothly.”

"Did you crash?"

"Yes, the entire front left suspension is totaled. Remember to get it reimbursed for me later."

You're always talking about money, aren't you?
"Listen carefully, you are currently 0.12 seconds behind Sainz ahead and 0.31 seconds behind Leclerc in pole position."

"Wow~ that's quite a gap, isn't it? He might be even faster on the next flight."

"I hope this hasn't dampened your confidence. How confident do you feel?"

"I never make promises about things I haven't tried."

The sharp screeching of the brand-new slick tires screeching against the tiled ground interrupted Shulong and René's conversation. At this moment, there were still more than three minutes and forty seconds before the Q3's clock finally stopped. After quickly reviewing the details that needed to be paid attention to in the next lap, Verstappen decided to go ahead and complete his last flight lap.

This time isn't exactly early, considering that the Jeddah Marina Bay circuit has a lap length of 6.175km. Warming up the tires and waiting for the window to prepare makes the time a bit tight.

After confirming with the driver that he was ready, Phil Prue, who was in charge of observing the pit lane, checked with the oncoming car to make sure it was safe to pass, and Shu Long then stepped on the gas and sped off.

"Oh, it's out! Red Bull's engines have been acting up every day lately, but it seems like only the Shulong branch hasn't had any problems yet. I was just thinking..."

"Cough cough!"

This week, Ran Ge is back in Five Stars. In addition to Bing Ge, who is a regular guest, the other guest is still Xia Ge, a veteran from their early days.

The youngest of the three "milk bottles" has returned. After a period of adjustment with the team, Brother Shrimp's milk power has improved, and he really doesn't dare to talk nonsense at crucial moments.

It's only been 112 days since Hamilton's last pole position in Jeddah, only 112 days since Verstappen's, and only 112 days since the other five stars.

As for how Hamilton secured pole position in the previous Saudi Grand Prix, one might recall the renowned five-star book, "Nothing Is Hard."

"Okay, we see Verstappen has started his final push. He actually managed to get purple in the first segment?!"

"This reminds me of the Starlight lap he failed to complete here last year. I watched him slip at Turn 2, but then he was flying fast for the first two turns."

"Oh? Look! Two purple sections! What did I tell you?"

What can I say?
No sooner had the soldier finished speaking than Verstappen's first lap time was marked in green.

Instead, Leclerc was pushed to the far left of the timing frame, and the color bar below him indicating the lap time was clearly purple!

Shortly after, Verstappen's fastest second segment of the race was also mercilessly NTR'd by Ferrari.

"Did they cut 0.3 from both segments? It feels like Red Bull made the wrong gamble this weekend. You can't compete with someone else's strengths while using your weaknesses! You have to play to your strengths!"

Compared to the other five stars, Brother Shrimp is clearly more professional in terms of racing knowledge.

After all, he was a real race car driver and a manager of a professional racing team, so he has more experience.

However, because his speech wasn't very fluent, he was a typical example of someone who had a lot of ideas in his head but couldn't put them into words, so he gradually stepped down from frontline commentary.

Although they were far away in Shanghai and couldn't get much inside information, the frequent changes in the Red Bull kit settings they were comparing it with these past few days allowed Shrimp Bro to glean quite a bit of information. And he guessed pretty much everything.

Red Bull is indeed trying to compensate for some of its cornering performance with a high downforce setup, but at the same time, Red Bull is also trying to leverage the strengths of their racing cars.

Strictly speaking, only the section from Turn 27 to Turn 1 on the Jeddah circuit can be considered a straight. All other sections have curves, and the sheer number of curves is not just for show.

In other words, Red Bull's current setup balances top speed performance in gears 8 and above while ensuring that their competitiveness in corners isn't too far behind Ferrari's cornering specialization this year.

The upper limit may be insufficient, but it can at least ensure that drivers can consistently perform at their expected level.

At this point, Verstappen had entered a continuous left-hand curve section consisting of turns 25 and 26. Next was the most crucial turn, turn 27. Even the usually talkative commentator couldn't help but hold his breath.

Because the exit point of Turn 27 is the very spot in "No Difficulty Place" that ruined Verstappen's lap last year.

Entering the bend
No problem, the braking point was chosen very precisely, and the left front wheel did not lock up as it did last time.

exiting the corner
The car's rear end swayed slightly, but it wasn't a big problem. The track has been widened a bit in this area this year, and Verstappen himself stabilized the car's dynamics almost without any damage by making a quick and minor adjustment of less than 5 degrees on the steering wheel.

Then it accelerated at full speed, and the left tire had already crossed the line at the entrance to the pit lane. It seemed that it wanted to use a shorter driving line to compensate for the fact that Red Bull's acceleration performance was not as good as Ferrari's when exiting corners at low speeds.

Three purple shards!
The final lap time of 1:28.263 is already the fastest lap time so far this weekend.

It seems that Verstappen's little trick here is still somewhat effective. In fact, he was still rather conservative at Turn 27. I don't know if it was because the shadow of last year had not faded or because the slight slip and loss of control affected his rhythm.

Strictly speaking, this slide might not even be considered a mistake. The wind speeds in Saudi Arabia were both strong and unstable throughout the race week, and the sudden loss of downforce at the tail wing is actually quite common.

A few minor flaws couldn't overshadow the exceptionally brilliant driving of the lap. When Leclerc crossed the finish line, Verstappen still firmly held onto his fastest time of the day for the third period.

Unfortunately, he couldn't hold onto the fastest lap time, as Leclerc snatched the pole position with a time of 1:28.225.

"Where's Shulong? There are only 20 seconds left before the Q3's clock stops!"

Shu Long listened to the information that René shared with him in a timely manner. One was that he could copy the shortcut line after Turn 27 from Verstappen's side. The other was that the northeasterly wind might cause abrupt changes in the car's grip.

The main areas affected are actually bends 13 and 27.

Jeddah's overall layout runs from northeast to southwest, and only these two 180-degree hairpin bends will cause a drastic change in the wind conditions of the race cars in a short period of time.

The impact on turn 27 is relatively small, since the overall speed is relatively slow, with an average speed of around 110-125 km/h when entering the turn.

However, Turn 13 is a high-speed hairpin bend where you can drive straight in at speeds of 215 km/h or higher. A sudden change in wind direction could instantly cause the front of the car to experience excessive downforce, resulting in oversteer or even loss of control.

"Now track is all clean, full pushing!"

"Copy!"

Having just passed Leclerc, Shulong waited quietly before Turn 27. Upon hearing Reni's push instruction, he simply responded with a soft groan, lunged forward, and entered the corner without even applying the brakes. The gradual increase in throttle perfectly connected with the acceleration process as he exited the corner.

This is indeed a very clean ring.

In fact, only Verstappen and Leclerc are currently doing their cool-down laps on the track. The other drivers who made it into Q3 had already completed their final pushes when Shulong came out of the pits to warm up their tires.

After all, Red Bull and Ferrari have such a huge advantage this year, with a gap of at least 0.8 from the group behind them, which directly cuts off their idea of ​​trying to sneak into pole position by taking advantage of the track's evolution.

Instead of indulging in unrealistic fantasies, it's better to seize the opportunity and achieve some effective results first. Only Red Bull and Leclerc dare to push the window of opportunity to such an extreme.

Therefore, Shulong is once again the only driver on the track who is still making push laps.

As the only one, he naturally has unique privileges. In fact, from the moment Shu Long stepped on the gas pedal with all his might, the broadcast camera focused directly on the in-vehicle view through the camera inside his helmet.

The first and second chicane turns were handled very smoothly, but because the camera was mounted on the right side of the helmet where the padding was, the view from there was slightly off.

Overall, there doesn't seem to be anything particularly remarkable, because very few F1 drivers are of average skill, and everyone here has a very smooth experience.

The difference between them is less than 0.1 seconds, and most people who are not so sensitive to speed may not even be able to feel the difference.

Among the commentators, only Brother Xia felt a slight unease.

Having been a race car driver before, this close-up view was enough for him to have a very strong sense of immersion in the car. He felt that Shu Long had gotten a little too close to the left side of the guardrail when he was there.
Unfortunately, there was only one shot in the broadcast, and without external confirmation, even Brother Xia wasn't entirely sure.

But at the next turn, Shu Long didn't even bother to act anymore. Regardless of whether you have the eyesight of a professional driver or not, even an ordinary racing fan could see that this madman was heading straight for the barrier right next to the apex of the corner.

Even among the 20 drivers in the paddock, this part is universally acknowledged as the most difficult.

Even Leclerc, who dominated the weekend lap times, also had his left front suspension worn out here on Friday.

From the perspective of the vehicle, the left front of the vehicle had clearly collided with the wheel, and even a large piece of the Saudi Aramco advertisement paper pasted on the wall was torn off by the airflow and the wheel hub, but it had no effect on the vehicle body at all.

"Fuck!"

Please disregard the professional ethics of a public figure; anyone who can refrain from swearing after seeing this is practically a saint.

What followed was a series of high-speed curves, the kind of part that insiders can only appreciate, while outsiders can't understand the excitement. All they knew was that the first section was the fastest in the entire race, and they arrived at the name of Shulong.

The broadcasters seemed to realize that a helmet-view alone wasn't impactful enough, and quickly switched the camera to shots of the outdoor area.

Then they saw Shulong speeding straight towards the No. 13 hairpin bend at 223 km/h. His previously stable cornering posture suddenly lurched violently.

over?
It's not over yet!

Shu Long didn't adjust the sudden oversteer at all. Instead, he maintained a slip angle of nearly 12 degrees and pushed the accelerator to make a slightly strange neutral steering exit from the corner.

It seems like I shook it off, but it also seems like I didn't.

Only the guardrails along the track indicated they had something to say. Someone who had used every inch of the track space executed a dragon tail swing, tearing a large piece of the Saudi Aramco advertisement with their right rear wheel.

You insisted on holding the Games despite the missile threat!

Just kidding, Shu Long has no intention of ruining his excellent lap for such a ridiculous reason.

In fact, the unnecessary slippage here does affect its traction efficiency to some extent. If you are a fan who pays attention to the lap time, you will notice that there are several small yellow timing points that appear quite abruptly in this section of the track.

It wasn't the fastest overall or the fastest for an individual; it was just slow.

But this was the result of his best efforts to make up for it. Red Bull's disadvantage in the second time slot was already quite obvious, so it was already quite remarkable that he was able to maintain most of his green and a few purple runs.

Turn 16 is another strange corner where the guardrail is right next to the apex. And because the curve of the corner is close to 90 degrees, it is almost a blind corner for drivers who need to close their eyes and crash into the wall.

Shulong went even further in this regard.

From the audience's perspective, before they could even see the apex of the curve, this guy swerved and crashed into the wall.

It just so happens to be the camera view from inside the helmet.

This time it was the right turn. You don't need to have an outstanding sense of the car or the feel of the car. Just the sight of the race car sliding at a 6-degree angle, sticking to the wallpaper and with the throttle welded shut, is enough to make a large number of viewers with slightly weaker psychological tolerance feel dizzy.

Let alone those with weak mental fortitude, even many veteran car enthusiasts felt a chill run down their spines upon seeing this scene.

Shulong's driving style was not intended to excite the audience, but rather to create a more comfortable entry angle for the upcoming Turn 17.

After this section comes an extremely long and almost straight full-speed sprint stage, which is also the stage where Red Bull's advantage is most obvious.

Thanks to his incredible maneuver at Turn 16, he managed to pull back the personal fastest timer for a single segment by flashing purple markers, which had previously given him a six-mark yellow timer.

The third timeout, except for Turn 27, was almost entirely dominated by Red Bull.

Even the section of Turn 27 that was widened this year was used to its fullest extent by Shulong, who also followed Verstappen's advice and took the shortcut he had just tried, going full throttle in eighth gear until he crossed the finish line.

Three-stage score: purple-green-purple, a perfect golden cudgel design.

Without those other random cars causing a commotion on the track, driving a lap of the Jeddah circuit solo is a really exhilarating experience, and in fact, Shulong is feeling quite good about himself right now.

Before Reni could connect to TR and start announcing the results, Shulong, who had crossed the line, quickly turned on his microphone to interrupt the engineer's attack animation.

Let me guess! Let me guess!

Okay, let's stop guessing. The cheers at the scene said it all, and the brightly lit screen set up on the starting straight also shamelessly acted as a spy who spoiled the game in advance.

Final score 1: 28.155
Why are you still staring at me? Isn't it obvious which position we're in line for?

(End of this chapter)