F1: Absolute Car Feel

Chapter 143 I'm sorry, I made too many mistakes.
Neither CCTV nor local TV station Six Star Sports has a tradition of broadcasting F1 practice sessions. In fact, qualifying sessions are often not broadcast at this time either.

However, today, for the first time ever, everyone started broadcasting it.

CCTV's "F1 Live" program started on time, with Sang Tong appearing as the host as ever. He stated frankly at the beginning:

"Welcome to the F1 Live broadcast. Today I will be bringing you the live coverage of the first free practice session of the 2014 FIA Formula One Singapore Grand Prix."

"In this practice session, the Mercedes-Benz team used Wu Shi, a Chinese driver, in place of Rosberg, the German driver, to drive the No. 6 W05 car."

Compared to the seriousness of CCTV's live broadcast, Six Star Sports' broadcast was much more cheerful.

Bingge and Feige were already seated in the studio. As soon as the camera came on, Bingge couldn't wait to speak:
"Welcome everyone to Six Star Sports' broadcast of the first practice session of the 2014 F1 Singapore Grand Prix. I'm sure you're all curious as to why we're so excited to broadcast a free practice session today?"

Fei Ge immediately chimed in, saying, "Because today, our driver, Wu Shi, who is only 16 years old, will be driving a Mercedes race car for practice and testing."

"If I remember correctly, this is the second Chinese driver to appear in an F1 Grand Prix week," Bing Ge said.

“Yes, Ma Qingye participated in practice sessions at the Italie Grand Prix after signing with the HRT team in 2012.” Fei Ge nodded.

They remember the events of that time very clearly. Ma Qingye had practically stepped into F1, but the HRT team couldn't hold on and went bankrupt in 2013.

Before going bankrupt, the HRT team tricked Ma Qingye by saying that he would be able to compete in the 2013 Shanghai Grand Prix. However, as soon as Ma Qingye's agent announced the news, HRT denied it.

From the perspective of later observers, the HRT team at the time probably just wanted to use this news to increase their market value so they could sell it off.

"If Wu Shi doesn't perform too badly in this practice session, he will most likely become a full-fledged F1 driver next year. He could very well become my country's first full-fledged F1 driver! And he's quite young!"

The soldier steered the conversation back to Wu Shi, without elaborating on Ma Qingye's story.

"Yes, even next year, he will only be 17 years old. But F1 calculates age in years, so as long as it is before December next year, Wu Shi's age will be listed as 16 years and so many days."

"Wow, this is insane! Seriously, I find it hard to believe. Has there ever been such a young driver in F1 history?" Bing Ge exclaimed, shaking his head.

"And this young driver is Chinese," Fei Ge added.

The green light in the maintenance area means the vehicle can depart.

However, the crew did not release the vehicle immediately, but waited until the other vehicles had left before giving the order to release the vehicle.

boom!
The jack was released, and the W05, with its tires just installed, fell to the ground.

Sid clenched his fists, worried that Wu Shi would stall the engine before he could even open the door to the repair area.

Boom!

Fortunately, after the W05 engine roared to life, it output power smoothly, and the vehicle slowly drove out of the repair area.

At this moment, all the cameras in the pit area were pointed at the W05, and the two commentators began to introduce Wu Shi to the audience watching the F1 race around the world.

"This is a driver from China, and he will replace Rosberg in the first practice session today."

The viewership for the first Grand Prix practice has never been high, but today it was exceptionally high. According to the data from the broadcast source, it was mainly watched by a considerable number of people in East Asia and Italy.

Wu Shi's hands gripped the steering wheel somewhat uncomfortably. He kept taking deep breaths to calm himself down, telling himself, "Don't rush, you mustn't rush!"
After driving out of the maintenance area and pressing the maintenance area speed limit button to remove the speed limit, the W05's engine roared to life.

Wu Shi felt the surging power within, and the G-force from the instant acceleration pressed him firmly into the seat.

The first lap was all about warming up the tires; no one was speeding, and Wu Shi was no exception.

"Oh! Wu Shi has arrived!" the soldier shouted.

"They really gave us plenty of screen time!" Fei Ge exclaimed.

"I heard that Wu Shi is very popular in Italie, and many Italie fans consider him to be half an Italie," the soldier said.

"I've seen this in quite a few foreign media outlets. He's been karting in Italy since he was a child, and his fame has gradually grown. Also, the lady of the house where he stayed seems to be an employee of Ferrari."

"It's hard to imagine that a Chinese driver would have such a great influence in Europe."

After just one warm-up lap, Wu Shi's emotions gradually calmed down, and he had completely focused his attention on the race car.

F1 is infinitely more complex than F3. He estimated that it would be impossible to fully understand this car without a whole preseason test plus several races.

So he didn't follow the rules. The most important thing was definitely the tires, because judging the grip is where a driver's skill is demonstrated. The second thing was the gearbox.

Tony TR: "The tires aren't warm enough. Let's warm them up for another lap."

Wu Shi's TR: "COPY".

He didn't argue. At Mercedes, one's voice carries little weight; anything said would only elicit negative feedback, and one couldn't even stubbornly do what one believed to be right.

This is the situation of drivers without results in a team, even Vettel faced this predicament when he first started out with BMW Sauber.

Following the team's instructions, he did another lap to warm up the tires. On this lap, he began to try to find the grip at the corners of the racing line.

In street races, achieving a good result simply comes down to who gets closer to the guardrail.

Tony TR: "Alonso is approaching, be careful to avoid him."

Wu Shi glanced at the rearview mirror, saw no car, and replied, "I know."

Then he began to accelerate.

We were now at turn 18 on the second lap, right at a bend.

Tony TR: "Avoiding doesn't mean you have to speed up."

Wu Shi TR: "I'm watching the rearview mirror. If I see him, I'll avoid him. I want to try speeding on the next lap. The tires are already at operating temperature."

There was a moment of silence on the radio before the voice said, "Please ensure the vehicle's safety."

"COPY."

With these words, Wu Shi's eyes immediately sharpened, and after navigating the 18-21 V-shaped four bends, the race car accelerated at full speed.

The next two turns, number 22 and 23, are high-speed turns that you can pass quickly. Then, you'll be on the long straight ahead.

He looked at the road under the lights, and the first lap began!
Seemingly aware that Wu Shi would be performing the flying lap, the race organizers also turned their cameras on the number 6 silver car.

The race car skillfully navigated turns 22 and 23, its smooth and effortless handling belying the skill of a novice. However, as anyone with experience knows, he experienced several slight spins while cornering, and had he not corrected them quickly enough, there would have been serious problems.

And the G-force on this bend was very high; he clenched his teeth and struggled to resist the load.

Not far past the bend, he arrived at the DRS inspection point. He pressed the green button on the steering wheel, and the vehicle entered low-drag mode.

The Flying Wheel officially begins.

Buzzing sounds!
The gears shifted rapidly, reaching sixth gear by the time it reached the grid lines, with a speed of 259 kilometers per hour.

Less than four seconds later, the vehicle's top speed increased to 306 kilometers per hour.

Just as he reached peak speed, Wu Shi immediately began to brake while tracking the track and turned the steering wheel to the left. The F1 steering wheel was really quite heavy!

Even when driving quite conservatively, the powerful G-forces still kept his whole body tense when the car bit into the apex of a corner.

As soon as he passed the apex of the bend and felt the wheel grip return, he immediately accelerated, and at the same time, the race car veered to the right, and in the blink of an eye, he went from the shoulder of the left apex to the shoulder of the right second bend.

The race car was almost entirely off the track, with only the left rear wheel on the white line.

sieve!
Less than a second after accelerating, the race car had to slow down again to enter the third left turn.

At the exit of Turn 3, there is a very solid guardrail on the right. If he can control the maximum distance here, he should be able to reduce the time by a fraction of a second. Wu Shi noted this in his mind and accelerated again.

However, it seems that the grip of the right-side white line to the guardrail is lower than that of the central road, or the white line itself has poor grip, the rear wheel spun slightly during acceleration.

Wu Shi reacted quickly; when the vehicle became unstable, he instinctively released the accelerator and the vehicle stabilized.

"That was close! We just slipped!"

"If we crash here, we're doomed!"

In the Six Star Studio, Bing Ge and Fei Ge both looked nervous.

In the repair area, Sid dared not even breathe loudly.

After exiting Turn 3, the slightly curved Turn 4 is another acceleration section. After pressing the left shoulder, you must immediately slow down to enter Turn 5.

On the left side of the exit of Turn 5, there is a solid guardrail. Just like the exit of Turn 3, if you can close the distance, you can get a higher exit speed and gain a slight advantage.

After exiting this corner, you'll find yourself on the DRS section, which includes the full-throttle corner number six, requiring you to contend with considerable G-forces in the corner.

Here, the race cars will reach their highest top speed on the entire track.

Wu Shi glanced at the numbers on the steering wheel.

314km/h.

He felt there was still room to maneuver, but there was no time to think. In the blink of an eye, he was less than 50 meters from the 50-meter marker on the right side of the track and had to slow down immediately to enter Turn 7.

At this point, the results for the first time slot were also released.

29.645.

Tony TR: "Your speed is good; you're currently the fastest in the first timeout."

Wu Shi did not reply, which is the fastest in the entire event, which can only mean that no one was trying to boost their scores.

The second time slot is the most complex part of the entire track. After exiting many corners, you might not be able to turn around and end up on the wall. If you slow down even slightly, you will lose a lot of time.

The vehicle swayed from side to side several times when it turned back.

Wu Shi only drove the W05 twice and had not fully adapted to its power and traction, so he naturally needed to make constant corrections and adjustments along the way.

Meanwhile, Tony was constantly guiding him to adjust the braking ratio and gear ratio, and sometimes even had him change modes.

He did exactly as instructed.

Susu!

After the second timeout, the result was 41.754, still the fastest on the track so far.

Tony announced the timing results as usual.

Wu Shi still did not reply and continued speeding. The entire third time slot had many right-angle turns. After 2023, all four right-angle turns from number 16 to 19 were removed.

Therefore, this place was completely unfamiliar to Wu Shi. He had already thought about how to deal with it in the first two laps, and now he immediately put it into practice.

He could feel the car understeer a lot and was very unstable when going through those corners, but it was definitely not a problem with the car!

How could a Mars rover possibly have a problem?! It must be that it's not powerful enough yet!

Wu Shi silently memorized the details of these points and finally passed through the straight line.

The final results are out.

1 minute 51.625 seconds, currently the fastest lap of the entire event.

clap clap clap!
Applause erupted in the repair area. This result was clearly far from the limit, but as a rookie, Wu Shi's performance was quite good, and everyone felt that he was doing very well.

Even Toto, who had his arms crossed over his chest, nodded slightly.

In Williams' pit room, Sir Alex Ferguson made a rare appearance, accompanied by his daughter who helped him in his wheelchair as they watched the game together.

"On the third lap, with a time of 1 minute 51.625 seconds, how much more time can he squeeze out?"

Before anyone could answer the question, Wu Shi's voice came through the TR:
"I'm sorry, I made too many mistakes."

At the same time, Alonso, driving the red Ferrari, crossed the finish line, and his time of 1 minute 51.631 seconds appeared on the data screens of all the teams.

Although everyone knows that this two-time world champion was definitely not running at full speed and was just testing the vehicle, the combination with Wu Shi TR still creates a sense of absurdity.

　Sorry, I had too much data to find today, which slowed things down considerably. Here's a 3.6k file.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)