CHAPTER 170: CHAPTER 114: THE FINAL TEST DRIVE (PART 2)

This is also the main reason why Qin Miao has patiently persisted in training for so long.

A week later, Prema completed the inspection of Qin Miao’s race car, and there were no issues, not even a trace of rust on the car, meaning Qin Miao could finally take his own vehicle onto the race track and zoom around.

Of course, aside from the completion of Qin Miao’s car inspection, his teammate Mick Schumacher’s car also completed inspection today. Both cars would be loaded the next day to head to Fiorano Circuit for pre-race testing.

From now on, the comparison between the two drivers of the Prema team begins.

Although F2 is not like F1 where teammates are the biggest rivals, it is inevitable that two drivers from the same team will be subconsciously compared.

But Qin Miao didn’t think much about it. After the next day, he took Qimeng and boarded the team’s big truck used for transporting race cars back to Maranello.

Without time to rest at home, upon arriving in Maranello, Qin Miao, together with his team’s technicians, unloaded his F2 racing car and changed into his racing suit in the P garage.

Qin Miao’s racing suit is like his race car, without any sponsor logos on the surface, very clean.

As for the helmet, Qin Miao wears a helmet designed by Qimeng. He recalls when they were stuck in Maranello and he pestered Qimeng to design a helmet for him, to which Qimeng eventually agreed.

Because that evening they ate spicy chopped pepper fish head, Qimeng was continuously wondering what design element to adopt for Qin Miao’s helmet. Inspired by the dish, she incorporated the element into the helmet design in front of the computer.

So today, Qin Miao is topping his head with a cartoon version of a fish head, sprinkled with chili peppers, resting in red fish broth with white noodles.

Honestly, when he received this helmet, Qin Miao regretted asking Qimeng to customize a helmet for him.

Now, wearing this helmet in the car... he regretted it even more.

It felt like he had a dish on his head, as if implying how inexperienced he was...

Since the car had already completed a self-check at Prema, upon reaching the track side, Sui Wentao and other engineers only conducted the most basic inspection of Qin Miao’s car.

Once confirmed okay, prompted by Frankie, Qin Miao knew he could head onto the track.

However, Qin Miao did not rush and instead sat in the driver’s seat doing several deep breaths.

The purpose of these actions was to calm his somewhat restless heart, afterward, he clasped his right hand fingers together, raised it 45 degrees upward, and gently tapped the car, applying a Buff to his own vehicle.

Although Qin Miao’s system did not give him the Machine Soul’s Joy prompt, Qin Miao established a connection with his F2 race car and could clearly feel that after completing this ritual, the state of the car beneath him became noticeably different, undetectable metal fatigue, and part flaws and errors disappeared by themselves, bringing the whole car to its best state.

Simultaneously, Qin Miao equipped the passive skills: [Strong and Healthy (Blue)], [Research Department’s Guide (Purple)], [Best Pirelli Tyre User (Purple)].

This skill configuration is what Qin Miao plans to use in the race, naturally taking it out for testing to see the effects.

After completing the ritual, Qin Miao then drove the car out of the P garage.

This was both Qin Miao’s first time familiarizing with his F2 car on the track, as well as his first official cooperative training with his pit crew, needing to familiarize with Frankie’s instructions and the tire-changing rhythm of the team’s staff.

There were many items needing to be tested today, but Qin Miao wasn’t in a hurry to start working.

He first ran two laps on the track, then returned to the P garage and adjusted the downforce a bit before driving back into the track, giving his all to perform a flying lap.

Eventually finishing with a lap time of 1:03.661.

Qin Miao felt he still had room for improvement, but the space was not large, able to enhance at most by 0.2~0.5 seconds. Due to F2’s inherent limitations, Qin Miao knew he couldn’t brush the lap time to under a second on this track with this car.

After enjoying the thrill of pushing an F2 racing car, feeling the massive downforce and lateral G-force provided by the formula car, along with the roar of the engine, Qin Miao was already eager to drive this car to the track and compete against other F2 drivers.

However, Qin Miao didn’t forget the main business of coming today, after the thrill, he started cooperating with Frankie’s requests to begin testing on the track, collecting various data.

After busying himself the whole morning, Qin Miao drove the car back to the P garage.

After unbuckling the seat belt, lifting the headrest, removing the helmet, and preparing to ask where to have lunch, to go home for the chili sauce, Frankie approached Qin Miao with a frown and a paper form in hand.

Meanwhile, Sui Wentao, Alvin, and Steve began examining the car system of Qin Miao’s race car.

Seeing Frankie’s face and the actions of the other three, Qin Miao could roughly guess that this test’s result might have some issues.

"What’s the matter?" Qin Miao curiously asked while placing back the carbon fiber steering wheel, which fit his hand well and felt comfortable to grip.

"There’s an issue." Frankie said as he handed over the file to Qin Miao, explaining: "But it might also be a telemetry system problem."

Curiously, Qin Miao took the file.

While Qin Miao was looking through the file, Frankie said: "After the morning’s test, we exchanged test data with Mick’s pit crew as part of the necessary process. By comparing the data between the two of you, we found that our car’s data on tire wear is somewhat extraordinarily unusual. Did you intentionally protect the tires on the track just now?"

Qin Miao, a bit distracted by the data, didn’t analyze the meaning behind Frankie’s words and replied directly to the question: "No."

Upon hearing Qin Miao’s answer, Frankie nodded and said: "Then it might be telemetry data issue."

During that time, Qin Miao finished looking at the data Frankie provided. Having spent nearly a year in this field, Qin Miao had become quite adept at reviewing data.

The reason Frankie and others reacted so much was also identified.

According to the data, Qin Miao’s tire decay during testing was at least 19% slower than Mick.

Although this figure hasn’t reached the 30% reduction in tire wear described in Qin Miao’s skill, this 19% reduction in wear is still amazing.

Because it’s just too much.

Due to this extremely astonishing number, Frankie and others concluded that there might be an issue with the telemetry system of Qin Miao’s vehicle.

After all, Qin Miao’s car and Mick’s car are the same, differing only in tune settings and drivers.

These differences don’t justify such a large gap in tire wear.

After testing, Qin Miao’s average lap speed is faster than Mick’s, fuel consumption is less than Mick’s, and most notably, tire wear is 19% less than Mick’s.

Such exaggerated data would make anyone instinctively think there’s an issue with the telemetry system.

Unlike others, Qin Miao knows the specific reason behind all this: his system skills.

Moreover, Qin Miao also discovered the pattern of his system skills, which depends on how he drives.

Throughout today’s testing process, Qin Miao maintained a pace he felt comfortable with most of the time, neither conserving tires nor pushing, hence his tire wear was 19%.

Qin Miao believes that if he drove the car in a tire-conserving manner, the reduction in tire wear would definitely reach the system’s described 30%.

Conversely, if he forcefully pushed, tire wear should be reduced by about 10% compared to normal wear.

The exact figure hasn’t been tested by Qin Miao and his team, but it should not deviate much from Qin Miao’s speculated data.