"Another unexpected situation has occurred on the track; last year's champion, Kokumoto Keiyo, collided with the barrier while competing with Chen Xiangbei for position, causing a large hole on the right side of his car."

"During the dynamic start-off confrontation, Chen Xiangbei aggressively took the inside line using his heated medium tires. His overtaking maneuver was extremely forceful, and even sitting in the commentary booth, you could feel the fire in his heart after losing two positions."

"Kokumoto Keiyo failed to take the corner on the outside. Although the car currently seems to be barely moving, this kind of damage to the car body cannot be quickly repaired, and retirement seems just a matter of time."

Just as commentator Li Bing's words fell, Kokumoto Keiyo received radio instructions from the team to enter the pit lane next lap and announced his retirement.

No one expected that last year's defending champion, this year's top seed, would end his journey in this way.

And no one foresaw that the race would enter a feverish battle after just three laps, with five drivers crashing out, resulting in a withdrawal rate of twenty-five percent!

With this intensity, whether the finish rate can exceed fifty percent has become a question.

"Odetto, Xiangbei seems unable to control his emotions, aggressively entering offensive and defensive battles which causes significant tire wear and will soon overheat the tires."

Sawano Hiroyuki wasn't excited about Chen Xiangbei's overtaking; instead, he was concerned.

The data from the car sensors on the monitoring screen were unusual; after just three laps, the internal tire temperature of Chen Xiangbei's medium tires had exceeded the threshold.

Anyone familiar with civilian tire pressure monitoring knows that cold tires usually have their pressure increase by a few bars with mileage.

If faced with high summer temperatures, it's not surprising for the tire pressure to increase by more than 0.5 bar.

The problem now is that Chen Xiangbei has only been driving for three laps, with two still being similar to warm-up laps without fierce battles or PUSH, and the internal tire temperature is already unstable.

There are still twelve laps to go, and the battle among drivers will intensify, so Chen Xiangbei's medium tires might not last.

The lack of team personnel not only affects tire change speed, resulting in limited strategy choices.

It also impacts the testing of various items during practice sessions!

If Chen Xiangbei had a second driver, even a competing teammate, as long as the team could share data, the two could share testing tasks.

For instance, Chen Xiangbei tests the basic setup of the car while the second driver tests fuel load and tires, achieving a cooperation efficiency boost.

"Wasting an opportunity is a crime; why preserve tires and stay behind when you can overtake?"

If the team strategy is planned, then the actual situation on the track is change.

Plans often can't keep up with changes!

Just now, Chen Xiangbei seized the opportunity exceptionally well, aggressively taking Kokumoto Keiyo's inside line to overtake and even causing his opponent to make a pressured mistake.

Odetto felt that Chen Xiangbei's performance in the Grand Prix could be described as steady progress, from initially struggling with basic car control to now precisely managing the car's grip and torque, surpassing expectations.

Given this, there's no need for extremely conservative tactics. Showing some aggression might just achieve surprising results.

Just like Kokumoto Keiyo's accident.

"But..."

Sawano Hiroyuki wanted to say more, but after half a year getting along, he became familiar with team leader Odetto's personality.

Different concepts, speaking more doesn't help.

Motana, leading on the East Bay Circuit and looking at the "13" number appearing in the rearview mirror, felt shocked and surprised.

[Kokumoto Keiyo was overtaken like that?]

Limited by the corner's visibility, Motana didn't see the collision scene of Kokumoto Keiyo, only deducing that he was overtaken by Chen Xiangbei.

"Motana, race officials have announced TOM'S Team's Kokumoto Keiyo has retired. Push full throttle early, don't let the Chinese driver Xiangbei benefit from your slipstream."

After ST Team confirmed Kokumoto Keiyo's retirement information, they promptly issued a push directive to Motana.

Even if Chen Xiangbei's medium tires reached operational temperatures, in terms of grip and lap speed, they're still not comparable to the soft tires at their performance peak.

Motana must speed up to shake off Chen Xiangbei, creating a pit stop window; otherwise even if there's a track incident later, there's no guaranteed position after exiting the pits.

You should know, when everything goes smoothly, a pit stop tire change takes over twenty seconds, and a safety car lead by a yellow flag can only save about ten seconds.

If Motana doesn't lead Chen Xiangbei by more than ten seconds, after changing tires and returning to the main track, he'll surely fall behind Chen Xiangbei and would rely on new tires' grip advantage to chase and overtake.

Conversely, if the lead is more than ten seconds, the position after exiting will still be ahead of Chen Xiangbei, reversing the attacking and defending positions, making Chen Xiangbei attack Motana's new tires with old tires.

Medium tires are already inferior to soft ones, not to mention old tires versus new ones. If this scenario occurs, Chen Xiangbei will undoubtedly lose.

Besides, there's another possibility, which is a severe track accident causing a race suspension with a red flag. All cars must return to the pit, and rankings remain unchanged.

At this time, everyone including Chen Xiangbei will have ample time to change tires, equivalent to a race restart.

Next chapter will be updated first on this website. Come back and continue reading tomorrow, everyone!

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