How Did I Become an F1 Driver?

At this point, some people might be surprised. Wasn’t Leclerc penalized to start from 15th? How did he chase up to sixth?

In fact, the method Leclerc appeared here is quite simple. It’s basically the conventional tire strategy used by all drivers who start from the back due to penalty issues.

Which is a set of hard tires running on the track with an offset pit stop strategy compared to the drivers in front.

Leclerc ran 17 laps with a set of soft tires, overtaking several cars himself, and when the drivers using medium tires pitted on the 13th lap to change tires, Leclerc’s position here wasn’t surprising.

And throughout the process, Leclerc’s lap times on hard tires were always impressive, and he didn’t encounter the tire wear issues on the track like his teammate Sainz.

Qin Miao and the others, under the guidance of the safety car, drove to the 21st lap before the race restarted.

During this process, the team also provided Qin Miao with the next pit stop strategy.

Because Qin Miao has the habit of keeping a set of each of the three different hardness tires ready for the race, at this time, in Qin Miao’s tire reserve, there was both a set of medium tires and a set of soft tires.

Although it’s said that the American circuit is extremely unfriendly to Pirelli’s soft tires, they can’t run many laps.

But it only means the durability of the soft tires is lacking; the speed of the soft tires can still be ensured.

It doesn’t mean you can’t use soft tires for the main race. If Qin Miao plans to use soft tires to finish the race in the last few laps, the team judged the best pit stop window to be between laps 48-51.

Pitting during this period causes the least overall lap time loss for Qin Miao and allows for some adjustments based on the situation on track.

And the surplus of the soft tires is sufficient for Qin Miao to use for a sprint in the final stages.

Qin Miao, sitting in the car now, doesn’t know the team’s calculation results. Mercedes isn’t Ferrari, and the strategy group’s pit stop strategy is quite reliable, so Qin Miao didn’t think for himself and directly adopted the team’s pit stop strategy.

Very soon, the race restarted.

Due to the 2021 season regulation that forbids the front wing of the car behind from overtaking the rear wheels of the car in front during the starting phase, Qin Miao began to hold back the cars at T15 during this starting phase, releasing the safety car.

By the time Qin Miao and all the drivers behind slowly arrived at T18, Merande had already driven his Mercedes safety car back to the pit lane.

And Qin Miao, finding a random spot, began to accelerate slowly just after leaving T19.

After all, Qin Miao’s positioning was somewhat random, so Verstappen behind Qin Miao wasn’t disrupted by Qin Miao’s sudden acceleration in his starting rhythm.

The drivers behind, Hamilton, Leclerc, were no different.

However, just when everyone thought the race would continue normally.

The race had just restarted, not even a lap completed, and the DRS wasn’t even opened.

A classic scene unfolded on the track again.

Alonso, after exiting T11, caught the slipstream of his future teammate Stroll, and then Alonso collided with "Young Master" Stroll’s car, causing Alonso’s car to be hit and fly up, with the front end raised high.

Normally, if it were a GT3 car, with such a level of head-up combined with the DRS long straight speed, this being a downhill as well, Alonso’s car would directly fly up, then make a 180° rotation in the air, crashing headfirst onto the ground.

But the terrifying aerodynamics efficiency and downforce of the F1 car quickly dragged Alonso’s car back down to the ground.

And the Aston Martin that collided with Alonso, its rear wing was directly ripped off, and the left rear wheel declared its freedom, running away on its own.

The most unbelievable thing is that after such a huge accident, Alonso’s Alpine car seemed to have learned something from Mercedes and its suspension didn’t have any problems.

Keep in mind that when Alonso’s car flew up, the left tire collided with the track’s left-side barrier.

Yet, despite this, Alonso’s car was perfectly fine.

Moreover, after the collision, Alonso’s car entered rally mode, and just as it was about to lose control the next second, Alonso forced the car to stabilize.

Honestly, after this set of moves, if you let Alonso do it again in his car, he couldn’t have done it any better than this.

After such a big accident, the race management, of course, called out the safety car once more.

Merande, who just parked his car in the pit lane, hadn’t even had time to take a sip of water and rest before he had to drive his vehicle back onto the track again.

Chasing the safety car, Qin Miao suddenly thought:

Hey, if this safety car stays out for a while, could it be that I don’t need to pit anymore and return to the original pit stop strategy of running the full race on a set of hard tires?

After asking the team’s strategy group, they also thought there was this possibility, but it still depended on Qin Miao’s tyre wear on the track. In short, the pit stop strategy devised became a backup plan after the second safety car.

On the other hand, after such a big accident, not only did Alonso’s car have no issues, but he even drove it back to the pit lane.

And after returning to the pit lane, they changed to new tires and a front wing, and then continued back on the track to keep racing!