Car Racing without Money-Chapter 515 - 201: I’m Not a Rookie! (Part 2)
Weber, who had a latent issue with the power unit, ultimately could not fend off Kubica’s attack during his peak. The two completed a position swap just seconds before the yellow flag was deployed and took advantage of the situation to pit and change tires.
Meanwhile, a tire change error by the HRT engineering team made Kubica the biggest beneficiary. He closed the gap with Chen Xiangbei and was about to overtake him in the pit lane!
However, Chen Xiangbei shattered Kubica’s hopes.
He saw the Renault car approaching in the rearview mirror, which prompted him to advance the idle start hurriedly, saving the gear shift start time upon landing, effectively blocking Kubica’s car at the last moment.
Facts proved that Chen Xiangbei’s decision was correct.
The TF110, by less than half a meter gap, blocked the Renault R30, maintaining the pit exit order unchanged.
This extreme pit exit block allowed the HRT strategy team members to breathe a sigh of relief. Only Briatore pressed the headset button and coldly ordered Odetto.
"Fire Henry from the left-front tire change crew after this race."
Frankly, Briatore was already quite dissatisfied during winter testing when the left-front tire change crew made an error.
But considering that most of the crew were former Super Aguri members, and he was a parachuted manager, Hua Bu gave Odetto some face, not dwelling too much on the issue.
Yet today another mistake occurred, which Briatore could not tolerate.
Not even Odetto could save him!
Odetto’s expression was very complicated regarding Briatore’s order.
The old team members from Super Aguri had followed him through the low times of the team’s disbandment and the revival of Super Dream to HRT.
Now having to fire them personally, it was indeed somewhat cruel.
"I will."
Ultimately, Odetto did not plead for clemency. He knew Briatore had actually given a second chance.
As originally stated, if the crew members cannot improve, it means they are not fit to stay on the highest racing stage, and it’s unjust to the drivers and the entire team’s hard work.
Many times, a seemingly "cold and ruthless" team is the guarantee of victory.
Just like the former Ferrari and Renault Teams, even drivers were just pawns!
At the pit exit, the two cars drove onto the main track one after the other; the safety car had not yet left the course, so overtaking was still not permitted at this stage, which provided time for warming up the tires.
Due to the safety car’s influence, the distance between the cars in the paddock kept narrowing, bringing Chen Xiangbei back behind Alonso.
However, his attention was not on the car ahead of him, Alonso, but more on the back, on Kubica.
Drivers have very keen instincts. Though it sounds esoteric, Chen Xiangbei could genuinely "feel" Kubica’s surging fighting spirit; he was impatient to launch an attack.
Track staff took quite a while to clear the debris, and it was not until the sixteenth lap that they finished, waving the green flag.
"North, the safety car is about to leave; stay alert to the car ahead starting!"
The team order came again, reminding Chen Xiangbei to keep up with the rhythm of the car ahead.
Often, when the safety car leaves the course and the cars go through the starting line again, the lead car will deliberately slow down to bunch up the pack.
Then, at a certain point, they’ll suddenly accelerate to lift the speed limit, thus gaining a slight starting advantage to widen the distance from the cars behind.
Chen Xiangbei was a pure rookie; he had only experienced static starts watching the start lights and hadn’t experienced this slowing and accelerating start.
If he wasn’t careful, Kubica would seize the opportunity!
"Understood."
Chen Xiangbei replied, highly focused, eyes fixed intently on the car in front, Alonso.
If Alonso showed any sign of accelerating, Chen Xiangbei would step on the gas and follow suit; his reaction speed had always been his strength!
With the safety car leaving, the front row Vettel suddenly accelerated, followed by Masa, Hamilton, and others. 𝘧𝓇ℯ𝑒𝓌𝑒𝑏𝓃𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭.𝒸ℴ𝓂
Top drivers’ strength was undisputed; none made a low-level mistake of being overtaken during a dynamic start.
Soon after, Alonso also floored the gas pedal to start, and Chen Xiangbei followed with his stunning reaction speed. At nineteen, his body was at the peak of adolescence, on par even against historical level drivers.
Yet the scene that unfolded next was entirely beyond Chen Xiangbei’s expectations.
Alonso didn’t accelerate linearly; instead, he seemed to "stall" for a moment, a pause that nearly made Chen Xiangbei rear-end him!
Seeing this, Chen Xiangbei slammed on the brakes and then turned the steering wheel, trying to change lanes and overtake.
However, Alonso accelerated again, changing lanes to block Chen Xiangbei, while simultaneously, Kubica seized the opportunity of Chen Xiangbei’s deceleration to block and easily overtook from the other side.
"WHAT?"
The sudden change on track made the members of the HRT team strategy group exclaim.
If the car in front weren’t a Ferrari, Sawano Hiroyuki might have suspected that Renault had issued a "cross-team order" to a customer team.
Alonso’s maneuver clearly helped Kubica overtake!
"What happened, did Chen Xiangbei react slowly?"
"It seems his acceleration was a bit sluggish; maybe the gear wasn’t matched well."
"He probably hasn’t experienced slow-starts before; a rookie lacks experience."
"Even for a rookie, such a low-level mistake is impossible, a typical novice move!"
On-site spectators could only watch the giant screen broadcasting above the track, witnessing Chen Xiangbei being overtaken.
