How Did I Become an F1 Driver?-Chapter 742 - 306: Eight Crowns!

Of course, this is the best scenario for Qin Miao, because as time goes by, Qin Miao's speed will get slower and slower, so Verstappen will catch up to Qin Miao faster than expected later.

Meanwhile, on lap 58, Hamilton launched another attack behind Verstappen.

However, the distance before T1 was not enough for Hamilton to reach a position to threaten Verstappen, and before T4, Verstappen used "drawing a dragon" to slow down Hamilton's approach.

Amidst the sighs of disappointment from the Brazilian audience, Hamilton's attack once again ended in failure.

But this attack brought Hamilton within 0.4 seconds behind Verstappen, and as they passed the third timing sector and reached the main straight out of T1, Hamilton was only 0.2 seconds behind Verstappen ahead of him.

Then the two raced out of T3 onto another long straight.

After exiting T3, Hamilton was only 0.3 seconds behind Verstappen ahead of him.

In the T1, T2, T3 corners, Verstappen didn't manage to shake off Hamilton.

Therefore, on the DRS-enabled long straight from T3 to T4, Hamilton easily overtook Verstappen.

This time Verstappen didn't "draw a dragon," as Hamilton was too close, and with the DRS boost, "drawing a dragon" had lost its meaning.

Verstappen's defense consisted merely of holding the inside line and, when Hamilton overtook him from the outside line, deliberately squeezed Hamilton to disrupt his rhythm.

Verstappen naturally hoped Hamilton would see his actions and ease off the throttle or step on the brakes.

But these two are both seasoned foxes, each shrewder than the other.

Verstappen's actions did not affect Hamilton at all; Hamilton didn't even dodge and just overtook Verstappen straight away.

In the end, Verstappen could only watch Hamilton's car pull away, and after Hamilton completely passed him, he returned to the racing line, all completed before the braking point at T4.

From then on, Hamilton, starting from tenth, moved up to second after fifty-nine laps.

On lap 60, without the turbulence from Verstappen's car, Hamilton opened up a one-second gap in half a lap, and by the time they reached the main straight on the same lap, the gap had increased to 1.6 seconds.

This shows that while this is traditionally a Red Bull advantage track, Mercedes was surprisingly fast.

However, this also meant that when Hamilton overtook Verstappen, he was eight seconds behind Qin Miao, and by lap 61, Hamilton was seven seconds behind Qin Miao.

This happened to be when Qin Miao got a slipstream and DRS effect from the lapped Norris before the DRS detection point.

On lap 62, the gap between Qin Miao and Hamilton had narrowed to just 5.8 seconds.

Eventually, on lap 65, Hamilton entered the DRS zone behind Qin Miao.

When Qin Miao saw Hamilton in his rearview mirror for the first time in this race, he was motivated.

After all, back then, Qin Miao wasn't afraid of Hamilton. Qin Miao's tires had a significant advantage over Hamilton's at that time, and even though overtaking at Interlagos is relatively easy, Qin Miao was confident he could defend against Hamilton's attack.

But now, seeing Hamilton in the rearview mirror again, all Qin Miao felt was helplessness.

Moreover, seeing Hamilton's closing rate, Qin Miao knew he might not be able to fend off Hamilton's attack in the next six laps of the race.

Under normal circumstances, with Qin Miao's tire management skills, a one-stop pit strategy with yellow and white tires would have been enough to finish the race.

However, this race, Qin Miao pitted a bit earlier, and the hard tire's wear resistance on this track wasn't significantly better than the medium tire's.

So Qin Miao's tires were just enough to finish the race, but defending against Hamilton would definitely push his tires to the cliff edge before the race ended.

If only Qin Miao had pitted three laps later on the medium tires, he wouldn't have this problem now, but there was no choice; the safety car opportunity was rare and couldn't be passed up.

Faced with that situation, anyone would have pitted immediately to put on new tires.

But now, all Qin Miao could do was do his best and leave the rest to fate.

But sometimes, wanting to defend isn't enough to ensure success.

In the next few laps, Qin Miao truly gave it his all, using "drawing a dragon" defense, braking late on the inside line, and squeezing Hamilton off the track.

Qin Miao tried every trick he had; really, he was just short of bumping Hamilton off the track.

But despite this, Qin Miao only held out for three laps under Hamilton's attack.

However, one must say, the Brazilian audience was the happiest about this race, because they not only saw the duel between Hamilton and Verstappen but also witnessed the three-lap long battle between Qin Miao and Hamilton.

In the end, Hamilton completed the overtake on Qin Miao on the main straight of the 59th lap.

At that time, it was due to Qin Miao's rear tire losing grip, giving too much throttle out of the corner, causing the rear tires to slip. Qin Miao reacted immediately, countersteering and slightly easing off the throttle.