Chapter 1400 - 526: Consecutive Championships

Chapter 1400: Chapter 526: Consecutive Championships

By the time Verstappen finally got past Alonso, it was already lap 33.

At that point, the gap between Qin Miao and Hamilton was still only 4.1 seconds.

Old Man also knew that even though he could finish the remaining half of the race on this set of mediums, if he wanted to look after the tyres it was basically impossible to fend off Verstappen’s attacks; ever since that safety car restart, today’s fight for the race win had nothing to do with him anymore.

He was never going to pit for fresh tyres in the middle or late stages of the race.

So Hamilton was fairly calm now, just running his own race pace as normal on track.

If Verstappen caught up from behind, then for Qin Miao’s sake, as long as he could hold Verstappen off for a bit he would defend normally; if he really couldn’t, Hamilton wouldn’t force it.

The second half of the race was relatively quiet.

After Verstappen passed Alonso, he caught up to Hamilton and entered the DRS zone behind him on lap 37.

In the process, Verstappen also took over the fastest lap that Qin Miao had been holding.

You have to say, that Red Bull car really is quick this season, especially once Verstappen got Hamilton’s DRS.

By now the gap between Qin Miao and Hamilton had already opened up to 7.1 seconds.

Part of that was because Hamilton was nursing his set of mediums and not pushing too hard, and part of it was because Qin Miao was going flat out.

And although the duel between Hamilton and Verstappen today wasn’t as intense as in 2021, Old Man definitely wasn’t holding back.

Basically every corner where he could defend Verstappen, he went through the full defensive motions without discounting anything.

But after so many laps, Hamilton’s tyres were still just a set of mediums, not hards.

On top of that, he had to run off the racing line while defending, so in the end Old Man still couldn’t withstand Verstappen’s attacks.

Finally, on lap 40, under the slightly regretful gaze of Qin Miao’s fans, Verstappen used the DRS top speed on the start-finish straight and finally got past Hamilton in the DRS zone.

At that moment the gap between Verstappen and Qin Miao had come down to 8.9 seconds.

And there were ten laps left in the race.

The key thing was, Qin Miao’s lap times were still incredibly consistent, always hovering around 1:32.8 per lap.

Verstappen had first gone by Alonso, then spent so long scrapping with Hamilton on track; you couldn’t say his mediums were utterly destroyed, but they were definitely on their last legs.

Even so, Verstappen’s pace was still around 1:32.5 per lap; compared to Qin Miao he still had a speed advantage, just not a big one.

As the race went on, Verstappen’s pace dropped off noticeably faster than Qin Miao’s, and by the time they got to the final lap, he had only managed to cut the original 8.9-second gap to 5.1 seconds.

On that last lap, Qin Miao’s lap time actually beat Verstappen’s by 0.1 seconds.

That essentially meant that even if this race went on for another ten laps, Verstappen still wouldn’t be able to challenge Qin Miao’s hold on the race win.

Qin Miao just kept leading all the way to the chequered flag.

In the end, he took today’s race win as expected.

You couldn’t say Verstappen’s performance today was bad; it’s just that he was a bit unlucky this grand prix weekend.

Behind them, Alonso’s lap times were pretty good, and he was on hards, which had better durability than Hamilton’s mediums; so Brother Tou’s pace was actually quicker than Hamilton’s.

But at this point you really have to mention this very distinctive Mercedes W14.

Anyone who’s driven behind Albon or Russell knows this.

Even if your lap pace is faster than the car ahead, and you’ve got DRS every lap.

If the car in front, without opening DRS, still has higher top speed than you do with DRS open, then that’s basically a ghost story.

And that’s exactly what Alonso ran into out on track today.

Thanks to the advantage of the softs, Alonso’s lap times over the last five laps of the race were already quicker than Hamilton’s.

But even though Aston Martin uses the same power unit and gearbox as Mercedes, the two cars have completely different aerodynamic philosophies.

The result is just like we said: even with DRS open, sitting in Hamilton’s slipstream, ERS turned up to max, Alonso still couldn’t close in on Hamilton quickly in the DRS zones.

By the time Alonso was finally about to catch Hamilton, the DRS zone was already over, and the two cars would arrive at the braking point nose to tail.

Basically every time it played out like that, Brother Tou was about to cough up a lung from rage.

This is also one of the flaws of modern F1 cars.

The cars are too long and too wide, and the direct consequence is that overtaking is tough; if you want to pass outside of the designated overtaking zones, either your car has an absolute performance edge over your rival’s, or the car in front makes a mistake. There is no third possibility.

But if your car is fast enough, you’ll rarely end up dropping back, and F1 drivers aren’t just one in ten thousand; one in a hundred thousand or even one in a million is more like it.

With a bunch like this, the chance of anyone making a mistake on track is very low.

Instead of hoping the driver ahead of you screws up, you might as well hope the heavens suddenly open and it starts raining.