Why race if you don’t have money?

Chapter 11 Liang Chi's True Identity

If you can't figure something out, don't waste time thinking about it. This is Chen Xiangbei's life motto.

What's more, he has more important things to deal with now. He made an appointment with Liang Chi yesterday to meet at the repair shop after school tonight to see how he would solve the problem of the racing car.

In order to save time, Chen Xiangbei waved on the roadside to call a motorcycle taxi. With the promulgation of the ban on motorcycles, there are fewer and fewer motorcycle taxis in Guangzhou and Shenzhen, and the prices are also rising accordingly.

Sitting in the back seat, Chen Xiangbei was thinking about whether he should get an "electric chicken" (electric car) to ride so that he could save some money on traveling in the future.

By the time they arrived at the repair shop, it was almost ten o'clock. Liang Chi was sitting on a recliner at the gate, rocking his slippers out of boredom. Seeing Chen Xiangbei coming over, he teased, "Did you get detention today? You got out of school at nine and didn't get here until ten?"

"Where's the car?"

Chen Xiangbei knew Liang Chi's frivolous character very well, so he went straight to the point without any nonsense.

"Parked in the back warehouse."

After saying that, Liang Chi threw over a bunch of keys from his pocket.

Chen Xiangbei has been working part-time at the auto repair shop for almost half a year, and has never seen the warehouse at the back opened. He always thought it was just an abandoned warehouse.

With this suspicion, Chen Xiangbei took the key and went to the warehouse to open it. As he pushed the shutter door upwards, he felt something was wrong. If the warehouse had been abandoned for a long time, such a shutter door would easily rust and become impossible to open, but he pushed it open with ease.

This means that Liang Chi often opens this warehouse, but he doesn't know it.

As the rolling door slowly opened, the light from the yard shone in, and what appeared before Chen Xiangbei was an eighth-generation blue Subaru Impreza nicknamed "Tear Eyes".

A Subaru Impreza WRX STI, to be exact.

Subaru Impreza is a nickname for civilian models. Adding WRX means it has become a racing model. Adding STI at the end means it is a high-performance racing version of the Subaru Impreza!
If we use popular models to describe the type differences, it is equivalent to the differences between Volkswagen POLO, Volkswagen POLO GTI, and Volkswagen POLO R.

Among Japanese performance cars, the Subaru Impreza is definitely worthy of the word "famous". It was once known as the rally twins together with the Mitsubishi EVO, and the two cars fought in the WRC events for almost twenty years.

But for ordinary people in China, compared with well-known Japanese models such as AE86 or GTR, the Subaru Impreza is much less famous, or it can be said that the entire Subaru brand in China is far behind those Japanese counterparts.

On the one hand, Subaru has never completed domestic production. Its status as an imported car leads to higher prices and limited spare parts, which naturally puts it at a disadvantage in market competition.

On the other hand, Subaru's car-making thinking is biased, and it is too focused on off-road and racing sports, while the needs of most ordinary families are fuel efficiency and comfort. There is a fundamental contradiction between the two.

However, the Subaru Impreza, which was not very popular in this era, became popular after it completely withdrew from the Chinese market. Many limited edition models were sold at prices higher than their original prices, and those in top condition were in short supply.

"Uncle Liang, you actually own a Subaru Impreza?"

Chen Xiangbei was very surprised. You know, the Subaru Impreza STI is not very popular in China. In addition, when Liang Chi's car was launched in 03, it was not officially sold in China, so it was very difficult to buy it.

Putting aside other things, Liang Chi’s shabby auto repair shop, including all the parts and equipment, may not be as expensive as this Subaru Impreza.

"Why, can't it?"

Liang Chi leaned against the door and lit a cigarette for himself comfortably.

"Uncle Liang, you're not a professional racer, are you?"

Chen Xiangbei asked tentatively. The CFR2000 Formula One racing car model on Liang Chi's desk almost proved that he was related to the racing industry. Otherwise, it would be impossible for ordinary people to get the design model.

In addition, during the past six months of part-time work, Chen Xiangbei has heard professional terms that are only used in racing sports come out of his mouth several times. This is definitely a conditioned reflex formed by habit.

Especially this Lao Deng, knowing that he sometimes uses the excuse of test driving to satisfy his desire to drive fast. Liang Chi not only does not stop or punish him like a normal boss would, but instead encourages him to race. There is definitely something wrong!

However, Chen Xiangbei himself had something to hide, so how could he take the initiative to talk about these topics? The two of them had maintained a tacit understanding for half a year.

Now Chen Xiangbei finally broke through this window paper. "Professional bullshit, do I look like a professional driver like this?"

Liang Chi immediately retorted and spat out a mouthful of phlegm.

Seeing his shabby appearance, Chen Xiangbei also felt that it was indeed not the case.

But then again, this kind of thing cannot be judged based on feelings alone. For example, to outsiders, Fujiwara Bunta is just a drunkard selling tofu. Who would know that he was the driving god of Akina Mountain twenty years ago?

"Then why do you have a Subaru Impreza collection?"

"As we get older, isn't it okay to reminisce about our youth?"

"What youth?"

Now that things have come to this, Chen Xiangbei must of course get to the bottom of it.

"The Youth of a Racing Engineer."

Liang Chi raised his head high. According to the scene, a tear should have fallen from the corner of his eye at this moment, thus creating an atmosphere of the passing of time.

But he tried to squeeze it out for a long time but just couldn't, so he had to give up.

If anyone of his generation said this, Chen Xiangbei would definitely complain, "With your appearance, how can you become a racing engineer?"

However, even though Liang Chi was a bit of a frivolous person, he was still an elder after all. He could only say helplessly, "Which professional racing team's racing engineer is this?"

“Not a professional team.”

"what is that?"

"Huasai Sports."

"Did you really build that CFR2000?"

Chen Xiangbei widened his eyes in shock. He wouldn't be surprised even if Liang Chi built a Ferrari, but he couldn't imagine that he could build a Formula One car.

After all, this thing has almost no soil in China, and there are very few automotive engineers who would come into contact with it. It is no exaggeration to say that it is rare.

"I guess so. I built an unsuccessful shell."

Liang Chi showed a bitter smile on his face. CFR2000 was his pride, but also an eternal pain in his heart.

Seeing the expression on Liang Chi's face, Chen Xiangbei understood instantly.

Others may not know this history, but as a formula driver in his previous life, how could he not know the pain of the development of Chinese formula racing?
In fact, China once had a wave of development in formula racing. That was when the Donghai International Circuit successfully hosted the first F04 Chinese Grand Prix in 1, which attracted attention and capital from all parties, including Geely Racing and Huasai Sports.

Zhang Zhicong, the founder of Huasai Sports, is an avid racing enthusiast and an investment bank manager. He feels the enthusiasm of the F1 Chinese Grand Prix and hopes to create China's own drivers, events, and even formula cars!
With this goal in mind, we formulated the CFR2000 R&D plan, and raised sponsorship to establish a factory in Donghai in 05.

As a result, the difficulty of developing a Formula One car far exceeded their previous expectations. Even if they purchased a Ford engine to reduce the difficulty, the chassis, suspension, sequential gearbox, aerodynamic shape, etc. were still insurmountable obstacles.

After three years, CFR2000 had only produced two prototypes, and its R&D progress was far behind schedule, resulting in a lack of confidence among investors, a shortage of funds for the company, and disagreements within Huasai.

In order to restore confidence, Huasai decided to let CFR2000 make a trial run at the 08 F1 Chinese Grand Prix to gain huge popularity and exposure.

Who could have imagined that this would be the final straw that broke the camel's back for Huasai and CFR2000? During a test run at the Donghai International Circuit, a CFR2000 lost a wheel, shattering investor confidence.

The debut show just turned into a swan song!

(End of this chapter)