How Did I Become an F1 Driver?-Chapter 473 - 212: Overcut (6K, Extra Update 3/19)_3
Lap 12, Hamilton pitted before Qin Miao to switch to new hard tires.
The team wanted Hamilton to use this set of hard tires for the rest of the race.
However, to avoid unsafe release due to other pitting cars, the release crew had Hamilton stop at the spot for over a second, and when he came out, the bottom right corner showed that this pit stop for Hamilton took 4.6 seconds. 𝘧𝑟𝑒𝑒𝘸𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝓁.𝘤𝘰𝓂
This pit stop time is critical in F1, indicating that if Qin Miao pits on the next lap, he could come out ahead of Hamilton.
But it wasn’t yet Qin Miao’s pit window, and because of his tire management skills, his lap times were still faster than Hamilton’s.
The team was also more inclined to switch Qin Miao to medium tires.
Although medium tires on this track were only about 0.4 seconds faster per lap than hard tires, and had much lower durability overall, their cost-effectiveness on the track didn’t surpass hard tires.
But Qin Miao was a phenomenon; as long as he wasn’t driving aggressively, his medium tires’ durability was the same as other drivers’ hard tires.
So the team decided to leave Qin Miao out on the track.
Meanwhile, other drivers also pitted for tire changes.
After these drivers had pitted, the top 5 drivers’ standings were as follows:
1: Verstappen
2: Qin Miao
3: Perez
4: Vettel
5: Hamilton
Red Bull was debating post-Hamilton’s pit stop whether to follow Mercedes’ strategy and pit as well.
But with Qin Miao sticking close behind Verstappen, they were concerned that once Verstappen pitted, Qin Miao would use the clean air to push hard for a few laps and come out ahead of Verstappen upon pitting.
However, if they didn’t pit, Hamilton’s hard tire speed was also about to reach Verstappen’s heavily worn soft tires.
Even though the gap between them was still significant, Red Bull worried about unforeseen changes, and Verstappen’s tires had begun to degrade.
After a quick and simple brainstorming, Red Bull decided to pit Verstappen while Perez was tasked with increasing his speed to put pressure on Qin Miao.
Though Red Bull hadn’t heard of "Tian Ji’s Horse Racing," they understood the concept.
Now, Verstappen was Red Bull’s only contender against Hamilton, so Red Bull should focus on Hamilton, not Qin Miao.
After all, overtaking Hamilton wasn’t much easier than overtaking Qin Miao.
As for Qin Miao, he was left to be dealt with by their second driver, Perez.
So on lap 12, Verstappen also chose to pit for hard tires.
The total pit time was 1.9 seconds.
Completely outpacing Hamilton, the time gap between them was a staggering three seconds.
The Mercedes pit crew was collectively silent.
But Frankie didn’t have time to worry: "Qin Miao, there’s clean air ahead of you, push with all your might, my tire advantage remains, try to overcut Verstappen."
Upon hearing this, Qin Miao also began pushing hard, fully utilizing his tires.
Now it was Perez who was bewildered.
Because after Verstappen pitted, as the team had feared, Qin Miao’s speed surged, pulling a 0.1-second gap even before T2.
The Mercedes and Red Bull strategy teams saw Qin Miao’s speed and were transfixed, scrambling to calculate how Qin Miao’s current speed compared to Verstappen’s and how many laps it would take for Qin Miao to complete the overcut on Verstappen.
"So you were holding back."
After lap 13, the Red Bull strategy team concluded that Qin Miao, on a set of soft tires that had done 16 laps, was 0.9 seconds faster per lap than Verstappen.
In three laps, if Qin Miao maintained this speed, he could overcut Verstappen.
All they could hope for now was that Qin Miao’s tires would quickly degrade, and he wouldn’t push too hard.
However, they were in for disappointment; Qin Miao’s tires were only 45% worn out, and could handle another four laps of high-intensity racing.
But by lap 14, the gap between Qin Miao and Verstappen wasn’t as wide, because Qin Miao’s ERS battery was depleted, and he could only run by extensively consuming fuel and tires.
It’s worth mentioning that seeing Perez couldn’t catch up to Qin Miao, Red Bull called him in to pit as well.
Initially, Perez was left out to pressure Qin Miao, but given the situation on track, Perez couldn’t catch Qin Miao at all.
But it seems Red Bull was intent on responding to Hamilton’s previous error; during Perez’s tire change, an error occurred, taking 4.3 seconds.
Nonetheless, Perez, formerly a tire conservation expert, maintained good condition on his soft tires after so many laps, and put in respectable lap times with the clean air, just coming out 0.5 seconds ahead of Hamilton.
And so it was that only Hamilton was at a disadvantage; due to the pit stop errors, both Red Bull drivers completed undercuts on the seven-time champion.
It could even be anticipated that after Qin Miao pits, he had a good chance of overtaking him as well.
