How Did I Become an F1 Driver?-Chapter 890 - 353: Flourishing Blossoms

It can be said that during the intense period of development and improvement of the car at Mercedes, the team's willingness to spare two hours to celebrate Qin Miao's birthday truly reflects the importance Mercedes places on Qin Miao.

Also, the team's staff seemed to have improved significantly as the celebration introduced a little relaxation amidst the tension.

At least the constantly taut nerves had a momentary relaxation.

After a simple celebration, it was almost off work time, and the team, taking advantage of the occasion, gave all the staff a rare day off, blessing them with an evening to rest thanks to Qin Miao.

Initially, Qin Miao had thought about inviting the team colleagues out for dinner, but as soon as the suggestion was made, it was unanimously rejected.

Reluctant to engage in social gatherings, everyone preferred to go home and enjoy a comfortable sleep with their rare night off.

After bidding farewell to others in the team, Qin Miao took the gifts they gave and headed home.

Upon arriving home, Qimeng was already preparing dinner.

Qin Miao was a little surprised, yet it seemed natural to see a birthday cake placed on the table at home.

Presumably, even without reminders from team colleagues, Qin Miao would have realized it was their birthday from Qimeng.

In contrast, when Qimeng's birthday was on February 2nd, Qin Miao completely forgot about it. If Qin Miao's mom hadn't called to remind them, Qin Miao probably wouldn't have remembered.

"Honey, I'm back."

"Happy birthday! Give me a kiss~"

...

Thanks to the joint efforts of the two Mercedes drivers, by the time they came for the Bahrain test, the appearance of the car had changed massively compared to the days in Barcelona after a month's adjustments.

The car was equipped with a new floor, but the overall structure of the sidepods hadn't changed, and a few strengthening ribs were added to the outer edge of the floor.

Besides these obvious changes, there were also noticeable modifications in less apparent areas, the most significant one being the larger opening at the exit of the Venturi channel on the floor. This design can guide airflow more efficiently to form vortices at the edge of the floor, sealing the car's floor to delay porpoising.

Besides, changes were made underneath the floor, and the connecting points of the strengthening ribs were altered to achieve the same goal of delaying porpoising.

The last noticeable change was the front wing.

There's now a notch in the fins on the inner side of the front wing to allow the airflow at the entrance of the Venturi channel to enter more smoothly. Thus, the airflow going out from the Venturi channel exit would be larger, providing better sealing of the floor, naturally delaying porpoising further.

This month, most of the team's upgrades focused on delaying the porpoising appearance time of the car.

The recent days in Bahrain's winter testing are meant to examine these upgrade results.

On the first day of winter testing, everyone within the team came to Bahrain full of confidence, and for the next half month, all teams would stay in Bahrain.

Because six days after the end of Bahrain winter testing marks the commencement of the 2022 season's opening race, the Bahrain Grand Prix.

Then, the scenes that Chinese fans have been eagerly awaiting all winter will appear before them, where the F1 paddock will have two Chinese F1 drivers.

Chinese fans can enjoy Qin Miao as the main course and Zhou Guanyu as the side dish.

Notably, during last month's Barcelona testing, Zhou Guanyu was sometimes faster than his teammate Bottas.

Thus, even though most of the time Zhou Guanyu's speed wasn't as good as Bottas, Chinese fans remain full of confidence and anticipation for Zhou Guanyu.

At least judging by Zhou Guanyu's current performance and adaptability to the F1 car, local fans now have some expectations for Zhou Guanyu to perform well in his upcoming F1 career.

Of course, Qin Miao's presence also raises fans' expectations for Zhou Guanyu subconsciously.

Normally, considering Zhou Guanyu's current ability and Alfa Romeo team's car performance, aiming to become a regular in the points-scoring positions should be their primary goal.

...

"No kidding, now I really feel the pressure is a bit much."

At seven in the morning, Zhou Guanyu and Qin Miao sat by the entrance of the Mercedes team's motorhome in the paddock, having breakfast together. Not far away on the other side were Barber and Zhou Guanyu's assistant, Simmons, who were also having breakfast.

The reason Zhou Guanyu came over to have breakfast at the Mercedes team was primarily because of Qin Miao, for whom Mercedes arranged a chef who could cook quite decent Chinese dishes.

To get some decent food, Zhou Guanyu came over to join the meal.

Qin Miao took a bite of the fried dough stick: "How much pressure do you have? Your current skill, though maybe not comparable to Norris, definitely surpasses the Haas duo, right? Even if you didn't do well in the opening race as a rookie, you could just say: I'm not used to the F1 racing pace, and after a few races, once you get up to speed, everything will be fine."