On Wednesday, Qin Miao went out for a walk.

Qin Miao has been to the Middle East before, whether it is the F2 period or the Bahrain Grand Prix, the opening race after entering F1.

At that time, Qin Miao still had a certain amount of free time, so Qin Miao also came out to shop, and he was quite familiar with the Middle East.

At least Qin Miao knew that after he went out, he would not be like he was competing in those sub-races in Europe, even if he was fully armed, he would be easily recognized by fans.

Facts have proved that Qin Miao's guess is not wrong, as long as he wears a mask and sunglasses, basically no one can recognize him when he walks on the streets of Qatar.

It's just that Qin Miao went out and walked for half an hour before returning to the hotel.

There's no way, the desert, there's not much but a lot of sand.

Qin Miao went out for a walk and came back with two taels of sand in her shoes, and there was nothing worth seeing on the street.

So instead of eating sand outside, Qin Miao still felt that it was better to stay in the hotel back in.

On Thursday, the work of the game week begins.

As the last game of the three-in-a-row back-to-back, everyone was actually very tired at this time.

Not just because of a three-in-a-row back-to-back race, but also because of the exhaustion accumulated from the 21 Grands Prix that had already been run this season after the end of the season.

Frankie hadn't had a full day of rest in three weeks, and the longest break was only half a day.

The only thing that may have given these workers some comfort was the bonus that Toto gave everyone after Mercedes won the Constructors' Championship last week.

The amount of the prize money is kept secret from others, and it is impossible to share this kind of thing with others, after all, there is an old Chinese saying: do not suffer from the few, but suffer from inequality.

It is worth mentioning that Qin Miao also received an extremely generous bonus, to 660,000 euros.

It is the same as Qin Miao's rider number.

At that time, Qin Miao regretted a little why he didn't choose the big one when he registered the driver's number.

Thursday morning's workflow was not significantly different from Qin Miao's previous process.

Morning in the paddock, walking the track, then going for interviews, a meet-and-greet with the local fans and finally a pre-race press conference.

It is worth mentioning that before the pre-match press conference, the two leaders of Red Bull and Mercedes were interviewed by reporters in unison.

Both team leaders gave an outlook on the positions and points they were expecting for the race, and then the crowd was happy to hear about it, and the team leaders of the two teams began to each other directly through the media.

The smell of gunpowder is getting stronger.

At the beginning of the practice on Friday, Qin Miao's hands trembled a little for this unfamiliar and familiar track.

The shiver comes from the excitement and shudder of being able to challenge a track that I've never driven before.

After all the pre-match preparations, the first practice begins.

Before the start of the first practice, Frankie talked to Qin Miao about the characteristics of this track, although there is a large straight track with a length of one kilometer at the Russell International Circuit, the car tuning prepared by the team for Qin Miao is still high downforce tuning.

After all, there are a lot of high-speed corners on this track, and because it is designed for Moto GP, there are no clear low-speed corners, and basically all corners are medium-to-high-speed corners.

After evaluating the team, it was felt that the high downforce tuning brought more advantages to the car.

After the practice began, Qin Miao put on a new set of hard tires and drove his car onto the track.

At this stage, the main thing is to collect data, and also make Qin Miao, who is driving on this track for the first time, more familiar with the track environment, and if possible, the team will also let Qin Miao run a few more qualifying simulations with hard tires.

Due to time constraints, qualifying and the main race start in the evening, and it will be completely dark by the end of the race.

Therefore, there is a temperature difference of at least 10°C between the track temperature in qualifying and the first and second sessions, so there is no way to test the tire wear under the conditions of the main race during the first and third sessions held in the afternoon.

Therefore, the team's main focus in the first training phase is to let the drivers complete some relatively simple but repetitive tasks.

After an hour of practice, Qin Miao's fastest lap came to fifth.

Although in the final stage, the team replaced Qin Miao with new soft tires and let Qin Miao go to the track to run two flight laps.

But in the last two flying laps, Qin Miao was affected by the huge crosswind on the track.

So the final result was not so ideal.

But it doesn't matter.

Because the results and data of the second practice are the most important thing for the team.

As the time came to the second practice, the sky gradually darkened, and there was no direct sunlight, and the surface temperature of the track began to drop rapidly, from 45°C in the first practice to 31°C before the start of the second practice.

And the wind at the scene also increased after the night.

However, the course conditions at this time are the most suitable for tomorrow's qualifying session and Sunday's race.

That's why this practice match is crucial.

Soon, the second practice began.

This time, all the teams released their cars from the P room before the countdown ended in Q2.

They all know that the second practice is important, and they all want to get more data in the second practice.

After the sun set, Qin Miao took out the C3-C1 tires and tried them for a few laps.

The final result was not particularly encouraging, as the track was a bit of a bit of a wear and tear on the tyres, especially for the front left wheel of the car.

Therefore, most teams should choose to let the drivers stop twice in the main race stage.

Eventually, the second practice ended.

Qin Miao's ranking after the end of the second practice is still ranked in an inconspicuous position, sixth.

Compared with his teammate Hamilton, Qin Miao's ranking can even be said to be a little ugly.

But putting aside the ranking of the drivers, Qin Miao's team did get good data in the second practice, and has begun to formulate Qin Miao's pit stop strategy in the main race stage.

After returning to the team's P room, he completed the post-race interview, and Qin Miao's work for the day was over.

On Saturday, Qin Miao ran more casually in the afternoon, because at this time he was helping the team test the setting of the aerodynamic parts of the car.

And Qin Miao's knowledge of aerodynamics is not sufficient, and the help he can provide to the team is limited to the fact that after the team adjusts the settings of his car, Qin Miao drives the car to the track and comes back from a lap and tells his car crew what changes this adjustment has brought to the car, and whether these changes are good or bad for Qin Miao himself.

But that's enough.

That's basically it for the three exercises.

Eventually, before qualifying, the team came up with a finalized setup.

Medium-high downforce and cornering characteristics are biased towards understeer, sacrificing a certain amount of cornering accuracy in exchange for faster cornering speed and acceleration.

It may not be the most suitable for this track, but it is definitely the most suitable for Qin Miao's personal driving style.

Soon, the time came to six o'clock local time on Saturday night.

It was already completely dark at this point, and the temperature on the track dropped quickly.

There were many spectators who came to the scene today, and even Qin Miao found out since Friday that many foreigners at the scene were holding the national flag of their own country to support them on the sidelines.

That's a noticeable higher percentage than when he was playing in Europe.

Qin Miao always felt that these Middle Easterners had an inexplicable kindness towards him.

Although Qin Miao didn't know what the reason was, it didn't hurt Qin Miao.

Soon, as time went on, it was time for qualifying to begin.

Qin Miao had already put on his racing suit and sat in the cockpit of the car at this time, and Frankie made a final nagging before qualifying: "The track restrictions in this race are extremely strict, and the penalty for crossing the line is merciless, you have to be more careful, the tires can go on the shoulder, but not beyond the shoulder......"

Qin Miao thought that Frankie's nagging was a pre-game pastime.

Soon, the 15-minute countdown to Q1 began.

Qin Miao naturally had no reason to go out and run as soon as possible.

In this case, the teams that have a low probability of making Q2 should go up for a lap and sweep away the dust and sand from the track.

After the track is clean enough, Qin Miao and the others will go out.

It's also an unwritten rule that gives drivers of downstream teams a chance to run a flying lap on an unobstructed track.

Qin Miao went out with 13 minutes left before the end of Q1.

Almost 10 minutes before Q1 stoppage, I started running my first flight lap.

And Qin Miao didn't show too much performance in this flying circle, and only came to the third place after running.

However, the good news is that Qin Miao's Q1 time is only 0.01 seconds slower than Verstappen.

At least it shows that in this game, Qin Miao's tuning of the car is still good.

In fact, after the first flight lap of Q1 was completed, Qin Miao had successfully entered Q2, but after returning to the team P room and refueling once, Qin Miao ran another flight lap on the track.

It's just that this flight circle Qin Miao uses old soft tires.

It is not difficult to guess what Qin Miao's idea is to run this lap, and he also wants to take advantage of this time in the qualifying race to familiarize himself with the track.

Don't miss a lap of practice at all.

In the end, Qin Miao successfully advanced to Q2 and ranked fifth.

The drivers eliminated in Q1 were: Kimi, Latifi, Gio Vinaz, Mick Schumacher, Mazepin.

Soon Q2 arrived.

Qin Miao used an old neutral tire for the first lap.

After this lap, Qin Miao's results can actually enter Q3, but Qin Miao doesn't want to start with this set of tires in the main race stage tomorrow.

So in the last flight lap of Q2, Qin Miao changed to a new set of neutral tires.

It's just that after changing to the new neutral tires, Qin Miao's performance has not improved too significantly, and it is only 0.3 seconds faster than Qin Miao's first flight lap in Q2.

In fact, this was Qin Miao's deliberate, in the flight lap stage of Q2, Qin Miao even deliberately slowed down in some corners where tire wear was relatively large.

Qin Miao's favorite thing is to stop in the middle of a two-stop race with other drivers, so it becomes necessary to protect this set of tires from the beginning of qualifying.

In the end, Q2 ended, and Qin Miao was stuck in a not-so-good-looking position to advance to Q3.

But it doesn't matter, after all, Q2.

On the other hand, Hamilton and Verstappen still qualified for Q3 in one or two.

In the end, the riders eliminated in Q2 were: Pérez, Stroll, Leclerc, Ricardo, Russell.

The main reason why Pérez will appear in the elimination list is that Pérez did not run well in the first flight lap of Q2.

However, neither Red Bull nor Pérez were nervous here.

Because they all know that with the performance of their own car and Pérez's ability, as long as they don't make too many mistakes on the last lap, getting into Q3 is a sure thing.

But sometimes people are unlucky, drinking cold water and stuffing their teeth, and when Pérez started to run on the last flight lap, he was blocked by a slow car in front of him, and then it directly caused him to miss the last flight lap.

Pérez couldn't cross the line to start the final lap before stopping the watch.

As a result, Pérez was eliminated in Q2.

Of course, this is undoubtedly good news for Mercedes, at least tomorrow's main stage is without a Red Bull block, Qin Miao and Hamilton can also be a little more relaxed when they are playing.

Of course, it is not ruled out that Qin Miao and Hamilton fought on the track, and finally Verstappen came over to pick up the possibility of a bargain.

On the track, Qin Miao began to push forward in full force on the first flight lap of Q3.

After the run, Qin Miao's results swept away the previous haze and came directly to the first place, with a score of 1:21.211.

Qin Miao finished this lap at a speed of 0.1 seconds faster than his teammate Hamilton.

"I'll just say it! Q1 and Q2: Qin Miao definitely hasn't taken out anything! After Qin Miao finished running, the commentators of Five Star Sports were happy.

"Actually, it's not right to say that, Qin Miao's speed in those laps should be the fastest lap he ran out, but it doesn't seem to rank high, mainly because he uses old tires."

"Anyway, I don't think it matters what happens, as long as Qin Miao's performance in this game is beautiful enough."

……

On the field, after knowing Qin Miao's speed, Hamilton asked in the team TR with some surprise: "Why is Qin Miao's speed suddenly so fast?" ”

"Lewis, concentrate on the game."

After a short break, the second lap of Q3 began, which was also the last lap of the race.

And Hamilton, who came out first, took the lead in responding to his teammate Qin Miao, Sanduan Purple, 1:20.827, directly 0.3 seconds faster than Qin Miao.

Looking at this result, and then looking at what Hamilton said after seeing Qin Miao's speed, it was somewhat humorous.

And Qin Miao started his last flying circle behind Hamilton.

It's just that Qin Miao had just finished running his first time segment, and Qin Miao saw the yellow flag on his steering wheel.

Although this yellow flag appeared in the third time period, according to the rules, Qin Miao also needed to slow down.

In other words, Qin Miao's last flight circle was abolished because of this yellow flag.

However, soon, this yellow flag was canceled, and the yellow flag didn't last too long, and it looked like it was just over a second, so Qin Miao felt that his speed loss was not too big.

So after the yellow flag was canceled, Qin Miao began to accelerate again, ready to continue to finish the lap.

It's just that Qin Miao just started to accelerate not long ago, and the yellow flag that had been canceled for less than five seconds appeared again, and this time Qin Miao didn't react directly, because this yellow flag also appeared and turned into a green flag in a second.

These two short yellow flags greatly affected Qin Miao's rhythm of the game, Qin Miao lost 0.3 seconds in the second time period alone, and even if Qin Miao tried his best in the last time period, he couldn't recover the lost time.

So in the end, Qin Miao did not refresh her fastest score in Q3.

However, bad things sometimes come one after the other, as Verstappen, who crossed the line behind Qin Miao, improved his lap time to 1:21.123 after crossing the line.

Because of this, Qin Miao's ranking was squeezed to third by Verstappen.

But in another dimension, the third is not much worse than the second.

After the qualifying round, the atmosphere of the whole team on the Red Bull side was a little dull.

The time gap between Hamilton and Verstappen was a bit too big, a whopping 0.3 seconds for everyone at Red Bull had anticipated.

Compared to last week's Brazilian Grand Prix, Hamilton's improvement was a bit too abrupt, and everyone on Red Bull's side was caught off guard.

At this crucial juncture, Hamilton's sudden uptick in performance was a serious blow to Red Bull Racing's internal motivation.

So when the qualifying session was over and the director showed the camera to the Red Bull Racing side, it could be seen that there was no one celebrating at all on the Red Bull side, and they all had a stinky face.

On the contrary, it is Mei Ben's side, although it is a pity that he did not get the second place in the qualifying round, but everyone also knows that Qin Miao did not get the second place not because of his strength, the main thing is that Gasly played Qin Miao's hand in protecting the tire.

So in the post-race period, it was obvious that the atmosphere was relaxed among all the team staff on the Mercedes side, and everyone could see smiles on their faces.

In Hamilton's team TR, Hamilton's track engineers can also be heard praising Hamilton.

Hamilton, as usual, thanked the team staff and looked happy.

As for Qin Miao's side...... After knowing that he only finished third, Qin Miao could only sigh helplessly: "Time is also fate." ”

It's just that what Qin Miao didn't know was that when Mei Ben was celebrating and was full of confidence in Sunday's race, Toto dialed the FIA.

Before Toto left his seat, the screen in front of him showed a public telemetry of Verstappen's car from the time Gasly's flat tire triggered the yellow flag.

It's pretty much the same as throttle depth and braking force.

And Verstappen's telemetry data shows that during the time of the Yellow Flag, Verstappen did not let alone slow down, and he never even let go of the throttle of his car.

……

In the end, most of the riders did not run on the last lap of Q3 because of the two yellow flags, and the riders behind them never managed to refresh their own results.

The Q3 ranking was also finalized.

1: Hamilton

2: Verstappen

3: Qin Miao

4: Gasly

5: Alonso

6: Norris

7: Sainz

8: Tsunoda

9: Ocon

10: Sebastian Vettel

……

After the qualifying match was over, Qin Miao was busy in the paddock for a long time, and returned to the hotel after completing the post-game work.

Although Q3 of this qualifying session was a bit regrettable, the third place start in the main race stage was even a better choice than the second place.

Because Frankie told Qin Miao that it was very dirty outside the driving line at Russell International Circuit.

After all, it's a track built in the desert, and the wind is still very strong, so the dirty side of the track will be filled with sand and dust in about ten minutes.

And before the start of the F1 race, there are no mat races on this track, such as F2, Porsche Carrera Cup, these are not these, only one F1 run.

You can imagine how dirty the track really is.

In other words, as long as Qin Miao starts a little faster than Verstappen at the starting stage, then Qin Miao can rely on the advantage of being cleaner on the inside of his track and easily slash Verstappen under the horse.

It's just that the next day, Qin Miao just got up and came to the paddock from the hotel, and when he was eating breakfast, he got a piece of news that I didn't know if it was good or bad.

That is, Maxim reported to the FIA that Verstappen did not follow the rules set by the FIA during the race, and Verstappen did not release the throttle to slow down after the yellow flag appeared on the last flight lap in Q3, but continued to run his own flying lap.

Mercedes asked the FIA to investigate the matter.

And after Red Bull knew that Mei Ben did this, they immediately sent a counterattack to Mei Ben.

They also reported that Qin Miao also had violations at that stage yesterday, the yellow flag appeared twice, Qin Miao only released the throttle and slowed down the first time, and did not do so the second time.

The race officials who received this complaint were all big, because the drivers involved this time were Qin Miao and Verstappen, two championship drivers, and the punishment for them had to be cautious.

I heard that the three FIA tournament directors have been meeting together for a long time, and they have not yet come up with a result.

Qin Miao, who was still watching Mei Ben and Red Bull scolding from the sidelines, found out a little inexplicably that he didn't know why he was also involved.

However, Qin Miao at least knew that at this time, no matter how anxious he was, it was useless, just be normal, even if he was really punished on his head, wouldn't there be a Verstappen next to him.

So for the next time, Qin Miao rested in the lounge and prepared before the game.

It was just before lunch that Qin Miao received a notice that both he and Verstappen had to accept penalties at the beginning of the race.

However, Qin Miao was punished lightly because of a slowing down behavior, and was punished three places for starting, while Verstappen was punished for five places.

So in today's main race, Qin Miao's starting position fell from third to sixth, and Verstappen fell from second to seventh.

Then Qin Miao was a little sore, how could she change back and forth, and instead she ran to the dirty side to start?

Now the only possibility that Qin Miao feels a little solace is that Verstappen, the driver who poses the greatest threat to him, appears behind him.

Qin Miao still has a chance to defend his advantage in the standings in this game.

But defending Verstappen is not what Qin Miao has to do, chasing Hamilton as much as possible in this game and narrowing the time gap between himself and Hamilton is what Qin Miao should be most concerned about.

(End of chapter)