F1: The Making of a Racing God

Chapter 234 The Wrong Saint
The front of the race car lost all grip due to the sudden loss of speed.

Shulong watched as Sainz charged onto the grass, then looked in the rearview mirror as Sainz swept past him, spinning and sinking into the gravel pit.

"Whoooops! I sincerely hope he's alright."

"He's fine, but he's trapped. Well done."

Hey! Hey! Hey!

What does "well done" even mean? Don't try to label me like that!

[I just accidentally let the back of my car slide a little!]

The best thing for Shulong wasn't getting rid of a tough opponent in the race, but that with Sainz getting stuck, they had to bring out the safety car on the second lap.

The maneuvers he made earlier significantly disrupted his lap rhythm. After being delayed by Sainz for a moment, catching up to the front of the contenders wasn't so easy.

it's good now.

With a yellow flag and a safety car, the time difference between the three vehicles is almost completely eliminated. When the green flag is restored, everything is essentially starting from scratch again.

Of course, this is a perfect start for Red Bull Racing. Ferrari has had one driver eliminated, and the upcoming race is essentially a fair two-on-one situation, giving them a significant strategic advantage.

It's just a pity for Sainz.

Yesterday, a perfect lap that could have secured pole position was inexplicably ruined. Today, in the main race, the situation seemed pretty good, but then Shu Long knocked me out of the competition.

Today's incident was somewhat intentional on Shu's part, but yesterday's was truly an undeserved disaster.

Talk about it.
Red Bull has been embroiled in controversy since the start of the season due to reliability issues, but in fact, every team faces similar problems in the initial stages of the new regulations. The most obvious difference between strong and weak teams lies in their speed of adaptation and improvement.

Alonso's loss of control and crash into the wall in Q3 of yesterday's qualifying session was not due to human error, but rather a hydraulic failure caused by a deformed O-ring seal, which jammed the gear and caused the car to lose traction.

Yesterday, upon hearing that Tou Ge had injured his wrist, Shu Long made a special trip to visit him after the match.

Then he was forced to sit aside and listen to the old man ramble on and on, complaining that his racing career had hardly been smooth sailing, and advising Shu Long to seize any good opportunities that came his way.

But Shu Long is currently doing well at Red Bull.

It felt like Alonso's words were advising a younger person, but in reality, they seemed to be talking about himself.

Could it be that after two years of setbacks since his return, the stark contrast between his past glory and his current situation has made him want to quit again?
It doesn't seem like it.
If I had to describe it in a more abstract way, it would be like Shu Long could still see flames in the eyes of his own agent.

Marco has been hinting to Shu Long to sound out Alonso's intentions. By following the recent clues, Shu Long can guess what the old man is planning.

However, before Alonso fully clarifies his plans for the future, Shu Long feels that there is no need for him to reveal everything to the team.

The safety car has been on the course for five laps, and the race will officially restart on lap seven.

Reni's reminder in TR pulled someone's wandering thoughts back, and then Shu Long suddenly realized that Verstappen seemed to be slowing down his pace.

Given Verstappen's impulsive nature, the fact that he didn't lunge at Leclerc after the safety car's roof lights went out wasn't because he suddenly changed his ways, but rather because the FIA ​​had refined the procedures for restarting the race after the safety car following the Saudi Grand Prix.

No vehicle is allowed to be parked side-by-side with the vehicle in front in any part!

Note the wording: it's "any"!
Without this regulation, not only Verstappen, but even Shulong would jostle alongside Leclerc to provoke him with his throttle and body position.

This rule, ostensibly for safety reasons during the restart phase of the race, also directly restricts the right of following cars to gain an advantage at the start.

With Ferrari's superior acceleration at low speeds, launching an effective attack at the start of the race has become virtually impossible.

So the question is, if there's no way to get rid of Leclerc, what would be the most beneficial course of action for Verstappen right now?

A plume of white smoke shot out from under the front wheel of the Red Bull No. 1 car before Turn 13.

What followed was Verstappen's "unintentional" over-extension, which forced the subsequent dragons to slow down in order to avoid "any part being side by side".

"Did you see that?!"

"Yep, Max apologized, he accidentally adjusted the brakes incorrectly."

Accidentally?
This is a tire warmer!

Cheeky!
Whether Verstappen intentionally hindered the team's scoring momentum is unknown, but any fan with even a basic understanding of the current driver standings knows that it's crucial for Verstappen to contain the team's scoring run.

Analyzing from the perspective of racing car competitiveness.

When Shu Long was able to beat Ferrari, Verstappen believed he could also beat Ferrari with the same Red Bull car; if Shu Long couldn't beat Ferrari either, it would essentially mean that the Red Bull car wasn't competitive enough to beat Ferrari.

This year's championship race can only be divided into two scenarios: either Ferrari or Red Bull.

When Red Bull is unable to compete for the world championship, it doesn't really matter whether Verstappen or Shu Long comes first.

In other words, regardless of Leclerc's scoring situation, Verstappen's only opponent to keep a close eye on was Shu Long.

This is even more evident when analyzing the integral structure.

Verstappen currently has only 19 points. Facing an opponent with 50 points and another with 34 points, prioritizing who to limit is simply a question that doesn't need to be considered.

Leclerc wasn't stupid; he noticed this ridiculous scene in his rearview mirror and promptly accelerated at turn 14.

This instantly created a 1.7-second gap between them and the two who were caught off guard.

Verstappen's desire to limit Shulong's ranking does not mean he doesn't want to compete for the championship in this event. In order to prevent his later strategies from backfiring, he can only temporarily put aside his infighting with his teammates and start pursuing the title with all his might.

But that's Ferrari, who took pole position so decisively at this race; it's not something you can just catch up to so easily.

The race restarted on lap 7. Verstappen chased for 7 laps before barely managing to catch up with Leclerc, who was on a tire-preserving tread, within the DRS range. Then he found himself seemingly trapped in a hopeless train formation.

By rashly attempting to overtake Leclerc ahead, there's a high chance that he'll be blocked by the car in front, allowing Shulong to steal his tail. After all, that's almost exactly how he moved from P3 to P2 on the first lap.

Shulong is definitely not the kind of teammate who would obediently sit and wait for death.

In fact, he's not only not very honest, but now he's also a bit impatient.

"What are you dawdling about for, Max? If you really can't overtake, let me try!"

Neither the team nor René responded, because they knew that neither of the two men on the team would accept such a suggestion to give way to their teammate and rival for no reason.

Shu Long followed the train for another three laps. While watching TV in his spare time, he suddenly realized that Aokang, who was originally in line P8, had already entered the station sometime in the lap.

Old man, Sister La, Nuo Baixue, plus Big Tooth, 13 seconds?
Gasly, driving his little Red Bull, was already quite far behind, about 22 seconds behind Shu Long. A pit stop at the Albert Park circuit takes about 19 seconds, which is just one pit stop window.
"I want to enter the station!"

"Max also wants to enter the station. Can you accept two trains entering the station?"

"Why is he going into the station? Shouldn't he be happy that I'm going in?"

"He's very determined to enter the pit, that's our competition rule, you should consider it."

Here it comes, here it comes. Whoever is in the lead, their strategy and principles will prevail. After being punched like this for so long, Shu Long was so annoyed he almost laughed. He really couldn't understand why Verstappen would ask for a penalty kick at this moment. Wasn't the reason he hesitated to attack Leclerc before because he was chasing after him? Now that he's not playing with them anymore, why are they still unhappy?

The problem is that Shulong has been trailing Verstappen by about 0.8-0.9 seconds. If they insist on both cars pitting, they will inevitably be affected by the car in front, and there is no guarantee that they won't end up having to change tires by 4 or 5 seconds, which would be terrible.

Fine, fine, you can go first if you want.

With Pirelli's tire replacement and changes to racing regulations, this year, except for a few tracks with extremely high tire pressure, the overall tire strategy is trending towards yellow and white tires for stopping.

Entering the pits early might give you a temporary positional advantage, but it will also place higher demands on your tire management skills in the later stages of the race. In other words, the later stages of the race will be quite frustrating.

Since Verstappen wants to use an undercut tactic, Shulong doesn't need to compete with him for the same track. The important thing is to try to gain a tire advantage for themselves, like the second stint.

or.
Knowing he wasn't going to pit, Shulong suddenly lunged in, quickly closing in behind Verstappen and synchronizing his pit stop with the latter's movement. He then activated DRS, sucking in the barely perceptible wake of Leclerc 2.1 seconds ahead, and began a full-speed sprint.

Waiting until the very end of the race to build up a tire advantage is too tedious. Verstappen's tire-saving efforts are exhausting, and Shulong's pursuit is equally agonizing. It would be better to try an overcut in this semi-dirty wake.

It is not theoretically impossible.

Verstappen, starting on white tires, would need about three to four laps to allow the tires to reach their optimal operating temperature, while ground effect cars are extremely resistant to dirty air from the car in front within the 1-3 second range!
After driving for two laps, Shu Long finally pressed the TR button on the steering wheel after a long time, when he heard the DRS prompt in his headset.

"Gap?"

"with who?"

"Charles is right on my face, so tell me, whose do I need?"

"19.4 seconds with Max, box?"

"Box!"

It was a bit of a struggle, but there was no time to delay any longer. Grabbing the third DRS segment provided by Leclerc, he pushed forward a bit more and decisively pressed the button near his left thumb to confirm entry.

The first window for yellow tires in Stint is usually between laps 17 and 25, but Shulong didn't leave any tire margin at all.

It's unrealistic to try to out-brake a Ferrari with this set of tires. If we delay any longer, the white tires will only get faster and faster. If we don't go now, when will we?
Dude, make sure you stop right there, don't mess things up!
It gave the former jack technician just the right amount of slight touch, and the roar of the four air cannons almost merged into one sound in his ears.

Before pitting, Shulong had already confirmed with René that no other driver except Norris would request to pit on this lap. However, because Red Bull is the team champion last year, the team pit pit was arranged in the place closest to the pit lane exit.

Norris is more than ten seconds behind and still doesn't know where he is. As long as Red Bull doesn't have any problems entering the pit, it's basically impossible for him to trigger a safe release.

So, the moment I felt the four tires touch the ground, before the green light above my head had even fully lit up, I glanced at the front jack and saw it had just been pulled away from the cable before I launched myself into a launch start.

1.93 seconds!
Verstappen's first pit stop for a tire change took 2.9 seconds. When Rennie saw that number, he basically had a good idea of ​​how long it would take for Shulong to get into the pit. The total time for Shulong's pit stop should be reduced to around 18.6 seconds.

"Mode 6, STRAT 6, we'll be competing with Max at the exit, be careful!"

"I only saw a few McLarens."

"He's right behind me."

Almost at the same time that Shulong finished changing tires, Verstappen received a similar reminder from Lambias. After a reckless and desperate drive, he finally revealed his ferocious fangs in Shulong's rearview mirror.

Norris, through! Ricardo, through!
Finally, after crossing the line and accelerating, Shu Long let the two McLarens pass by. Then, he entered the corner almost side by side with Verstappen on the inside line, and used the short line from the widened part of the inside corner to pull back in front of Verstappen.

That position looks so familiar!

Didn't Verstappen just snatch P2 from Shulong from the outside of Turn 2 on the first lap?

"Ouch! It's so cold! The tires of the Shulong truck haven't even warmed up yet!"

"Can we hold on? If we can, this will be a very successful strategic variation!"

As Shulong's car swayed unnaturally on the outside of Turn 2, the commentators from Five Stars also tensed up.

Suddenly, the soldier recalled the scene of Hamilton being rudely treated by rookie Zhou Guanyu at the Bahrain opening game, and blurted out something without thinking:
"They can't hold on, can they? These tires are too slippery!"

Oh? Ge Zhen?

It seems that Shulong will have a hard time holding onto its hard-won position improvement, because the detection points that allow DRS access after Turn 2 are before Turns 16, 15, and 14!
In other words, the Shulong that has just left the station theoretically does not have DRS activation authority; at most, it can only catch the wake of a McLaren.

In contrast, Verstappen is currently only 0.93 seconds behind Ricciardo. With the advantage of tire temperature and the speed boost from DRS, it seems that Shulong has no chance to put up a fight.
When the commentators on the English-speaking side saw two Red Bulls speeding past one after the other, with both cars' rear wings tightly closed, even they were a bit confused.

"Could it be that Max was too nervous and forgot to press the button?"

"Bullshit! I don't believe they'd forget to turn on DRS even if you forgot to wear underwear today!"

Of course, it's impossible that DRS was present but forgotten to be activated. The fact that there was no DRS when the distance was so close is indeed a somewhat counterintuitive scene. However, if the commentators had a track layout diagram at hand and glanced at it, they would basically understand what happened.

The detection points are set up too far apart, and it's a rare setting where one detection point determines the right to use two DRS segments.

Verstappen had indeed put in his all to chase, but he only managed to get within a second of Ricciardo after turning 15 into 16, and only managed to catch up by using the slipstream to discharge at full power.

Even without this wake, Shulong should have landed steadily in front of Max after leaving the station.

The swaying of the car body that occurred earlier due to insufficient grip wasn't entirely a bad thing.

Although Shulong's exit traction was also significantly affected, he had deliberately chosen to stay in the center line at Turn 2. His slide startled Verstappen, who eased off the throttle and swerved to the inside, completely giving up the opportunity to attack.

no way.

If a collision occurs and both cars retire, Verstappen is definitely the one who can least afford to lose points.

At that time, the point difference between him and Shu Long will remain at 31 points, and the point difference with Leclerc will conservatively reach 40 points. Unless Ferrari pulls some tricks, this is definitely not a point that can be easily caught up.

With the help of the two McLarens, Shu Long managed to withstand the attacks from his teammates during those two laps when the tires were still warm, but the McLarens managed to slow down his pace for those two laps.

The two Red Bulls battled it out for a long time, but in the end, the Leclerc was the one that got the best deal.

Leclerc, who was leading in the clean air ahead, was running at a very comfortable pace to maintain his tire condition. Including his pit stop time, his lead over Shulong had reached 6.7 seconds. He even encountered a yellow flag just as he was about to pit.

Vettel made a mistake exiting Turn 4, his rear end instantly went out of control and spun, eventually crashing into the barrier.

A yellow flag can reduce the pit stop time loss from 19 seconds to 12 seconds, and it seems that even God is planning to help Leclerc retain this championship.

It seems so!

Upon learning of the accident, Shu Long's first thought was, "Why is it you again?"

Uncle Tilty Head, who has recovered from his illness, seems to be in a rather out-of-form state. This is already his third time on the wall this competition week, and he and young master Stroll are really competing for the best.

But when Shulong passed by Turn 4 and saw the mess, his inner thoughts honestly turned out to be: "Thank goodness it's always you!"

Even after moving from Red Bull to Ferrari and then to Aston Martin, as a four-time champion who built Red Bull's first team dynasty, Uncle Wai Tou still cares about his younger colleagues at Red Bull, just as he did for Shu Long back then.

Safety car!
(End of this chapter)