F1: The Making of a Racing God

Chapter 44 Long-awaited New Glossary
Since 17, when he was still racing, Shu Long had been working as a test driver for the Red Bull team under Marko's arrangement.

This status is lower than that of a reserve driver; it's basically just giving you a title that gives you a legitimate reason to touch an F1 car.

Shu Long, who won the F2 championship in 17, might have been promoted to the Toro Rosso team by Marko in the last few F1 races of the 17 season, according to the rules that had not been rewritten by the FIA ​​a few years ago.

Unfortunately, Max had already paved this path, and with such a typical example that wasn't exactly a positive one, the FIA ​​wisely chose to completely block any possibility for those who followed.

Shu Long's work in the first half of 18 consisted of traveling all over the world with the team, and being occasionally thrown into some strange races by Marco, where he would drive completely unfamiliar cars for a temporary race.

He was also frequently recalled to the Red Bull factory in Milton Keynes, where R&D would need him to run a reference dataset on the simulator whenever there was any new progress.

This task is actually handled by dedicated simulator drivers, and reserve drivers from the team also take on this role when they have free time.

Originally, there was no need for Shu Long to be in this position. No one would expect a brand-new rookie to provide any useful data. It was simply to let the newcomer get a feel for working in a racing team and to give him more practice on the simulator.

However, Red Bull has something special now: Verstappen, who has been promoted to the Red Bull Racing team, is also a racing fanatic addicted to simulators, so the data from Max runs accounts for a large proportion of the research and development work at the factory.

On the simulator, everyone drives the same cars with the same parameters, but the abilities of each person can vary greatly.

Reserve drivers and simulator drivers often fail to achieve the results the designers envisioned, and it's quite common to see Newey training people in the factory.

Mercedes' racing cars in recent years have been pure galactic cars. If Red Bull wants to compete with them head-on, it can only find a way to take an unconventional approach.

The most serious problem is that, based on feedback from the simulator drivers, the factory's hard work may have resulted in a negative upgrade, with the drivers' lap times dropping to mid-tier, earth-class levels. Who can handle that?

When I looked at the data that Verstappen had run in his spare time, hey! Guess what?

The formula is correct, and the result is correct, but the intermediate process is a complete mess. Whose fault is this?
Anyway, it wasn't because of Shu Long; his lap times on the simulator were often even faster than Verstappen's, to the point of being distorted.

Simply put, this kind of superhuman driving style can be used on simulators, but the same conditions will not produce the same results on real cars and real tracks. It's just garbage data with absolutely no reference value.

After all, it's not a real race car. A simulator is essentially a program written by a person to imitate the effect of a real car, and code will have bugs.

It is well known that cheating can easily trigger bugs, and unfortunately, Shulong has cheats that cannot be detected by the program.

Others need to write a web crawler to slowly scrape the code to find bugs in a program, but Shu Long finds bugs purely by feel.

By exploring the performance of racing cars in the simulator through "Friction Control", Shu Long can always find a magical sweet spot line that is not what the designer originally intended in the feedback from the reverse wheel. At the most exaggerated time, it can be 2 seconds faster than the real car.

So for a long time, Shu Long remained on the R&D department's blacklist after being fooled by the "boy who cried wolf" incident. He was left to do his own thing, with no one asking or caring.

It wasn't until the astonished Max reported the matter to Marco that the old man, both amused and exasperated, explicitly forbade Shulong from engaging in malicious exploitation of game bugs, and instead ordered him to strictly adhere to real-world racing car and track conditions to achieve the expected results.

After that, Shu Long almost naturally became the new hot commodity of the racing car R&D department, helping them correct the defects of the simulator while improving the data of their crazy custom-tuned car.

Max needed to prepare for the real-world Grand Prix, so he couldn't keep running to the Red Bull factory. With the other simulator drivers lacking the necessary skills, a lot of work naturally fell on Shu Long's shoulders.

Especially in the period leading up to the summer break, Shu Long spent at least 12 hours a day on the simulator, excluding the most basic physical exercise, meals and rest.

It's unclear whether this is related to the incident, but there are rumors within the team that Horner's desire to renew Ricciardo's contract has been hindered, and Ricciardo seems to have begun contacting other teams.

Daniel believes the team's resources are being allocated too heavily, and the design and development style of the race car has been increasingly biased towards Max at some point.

Especially after Azerbaijan's Red Bull cars retired from the race due to Verstappen's rude and illegal blocking of his teammate, both Marko and Horner's first reaction was to blame him as the victim. This was very difficult for Daniel to accept, and he vaguely understood some of Mark Webber's feelings back then.

Returning to Shu Long, one of the main culprits, Red Bull Capital's exploitation of child labor was not entirely meaningless. After continuous communication and negotiation with engineers, a long-awaited new entry was finally updated on Shu Long's panel.

【Core of Collaboration: 17%】: Racing is not a sport for one person; excellent teamwork and tacit understanding are the key.

Perhaps because the results achieved by Shulong in F3 and F2 races were largely due to solo performances, the engineers' abilities were not fully demonstrated, and their workload was sometimes much less than that of their teammates, so there was not much teamwork involved.

Now that he has officially joined the F1 team, Shu Long, being a newcomer, can only try his best to cooperate with them and gradually figure out a working rhythm that is comfortable for both parties.

The so-called "core of collaboration" is, as the name suggests, the ability that enables Shulong to take the lead in work behavior during team collaboration.

The appearance of the entry did not seem to bring any changes to Shulong. Unlike other entries, it did not bring about immediate evolution. It only improved the efficiency of daily work, which seemed to be a natural result after everyone became familiar with it.

In reality, this concept is quite general and encompasses a wide range of abilities, but it is not a superpower that directly controls other people's behavior. It can be roughly understood as an amplification of Shulong's intelligence and emotional intelligence.

If we break it down in detail, based on the system's style, we should be able to create at least a series of sub-categories such as "reading between the lines," "overall planning," "leadership qualities," and "tactical vision."

Based on the current results, Shulong can easily understand the needs of the R&D team, and when conveying his actual feelings, he can make the other party understand more easily and accurately.

This is what you call working together and having a good understanding. Looking back, the previous cooperation model with Hayden and the others was more like a client making demands and a service provider trying their best to meet those demands.

Moreover, Shulong is definitely the client, so basically it's fine as it is.

As time went on, Shu Long gradually developed an inexplicable tacit understanding with the team members, somewhat like how they knew whether to hand him a wrench or a screwdriver just by raising their hands without saying a word.

There weren't any other significant changes; the only difference was that the body's basic three dimensions had approached 100% progress after two years of continuous training and competition.

[Bone and muscle strength: 93%] [Endurance and tolerance: 97%]

[Neural reflexes, recruitment speed: 99%]

Each previous achievement of unlocking 100% of the previous attributes brought about a complete transformation for Shulong. To be honest, it's hard for anyone not to be curious about the effects of the remaining attributes, and Shulong is no exception.

It feels like you've already pulled 85 times out of 90 pulls to guarantee a win, but after searching through your quest log and running all over the map, you realize you can't find a single gem.

At first, Shu Long was like someone with obsessive-compulsive disorder, frantically trying to fill up all the entries. Unfortunately, the closer he got to the limit, the slower the progress became. Later, he became more easygoing.

Anyway, it won't go wrong. The guaranteed reward mechanism has already been written in the user manual. In addition to training, the progress of unlocking is also related to the degree of physical development. It's just a matter of two years earlier or two years later.

Speaking of development, in the past two years, the system of Shulong seems to have finally remembered that it is called the "Extreme Career Assistance System" instead of the "Career Growth Limit Burden System".

After slowly climbing to 186 cm, Shu Long's height finally stabilized, while his weight dropped back to 76 kg. With his helmet and racing suit, the weight was just right, and he didn't even need to add any weights.

Thank goodness, sometimes he worried that if he grew up to be like his father, he might find himself unable to even fit into the cockpit before he even officially started driving in F1.
The overall muscle mass is quite good, looking like Zoro from One Piece, full of power but not overly bulky. Even Elena, the fitness manager of the Dragon Slayer, finds it incredible.

Let alone in the racing world, this incredible talent would be perfectly acceptable in the fitness world as well; the shape and proportion of his muscles can even be described as "beautiful".

It is speculated that the [bones and muscle strength] of the dragon indicates that the amount of muscle is already sufficient, and it is gradually developing from muscle hypertrophy to strengthening of muscle fibers.

Other benefits are still unknown, but for Shulong, the biggest advantage right now is that he can finally stop suppressing his foodie heart, which he has held since childhood, as he used to.

As for the concern about excessive calorie intake, with so much work every day, why not just find a little opportunity to release those few "empty" thoughts that have been sealed away?
Thanks to Shulong's extremely efficient work, a month before the start of the German Grand Prix, Shulong helped the R&D department collect most of the data needed for the summer break.

The despicable capitalist Marco finally had a change of heart and, unusually, gave Shulong an early summer vacation.

Moreover, returning to China is not a chance for him to go on vacation. The most challenging task for Shu Long on this trip is to obtain the domestic driver's license required for his current super license before the start of the Belgian Grand Prix after the summer break.

As for whether the time will be a bit tight or anything like that...
joke!

He's about to be on the track participating in the world's highest level of racing competitions. If he can't even get a driver's license, Marco would feel ashamed to admit it!
Having not returned to China for some time, Shu Long could only leave these matters to his mother back home to arrange.

When it comes to something as trivial as getting a driver's license, there's only one requirement: as quickly as possible, and as quickly as possible again.

Upon landing in Fujian, Shulong, who had already reviewed the driving test guide on the plane, immediately went to take the written test (Subject 1).

As for why it's here, it's because Shu Long's mother has been busy here recently trying to see if she can get some decent sponsorship for Shu Long. This matter requires the help of Grandpa Gan, who is practically a local bigwig, to make connections, but unfortunately, it's not an easy task.

After all, it's time to consider officially entering F1. As a highly commercialized sport, a team needs to consider not only the drivers' abilities but also their commercial value as a crucial factor when evaluating a driver's worth.

The Red Bull system is relatively good in this respect. With its beverages sold all over the world, they are not short of money at all. In comparison, they value a driver's ability more.

Of course, more money doesn't hurt. If the skill gap between drivers isn't too big, teams that need to make a profit naturally won't mind making their year-end financial report look better.

A large portion of the drivers in the paddock can be considered paid drivers, which is not particularly shameful. Everyone has some form of sponsorship for themselves or their team.

Bosses like employees who can bring them results, whether it's achievements or money. You have to find a way to bring positive benefits to the company, right?

Of course, without the corresponding ability to support them, even if a mediocre student gets into the top class through connections, the pressure from the environment is not something that just anyone can withstand.

Before officially entering F1, it's hard to say whether Shulong's current strength is guaranteed. Only a real battle can give everyone a more definite answer.

As parents, they were unwilling to sit idly at home waiting for their son to become arrogant, so they naturally wanted to do their best to give Shulong some leverage in negotiations.

Moved by this reason, Shu Long didn't think much of it. After easily getting a perfect score on the first part of the driving test, he obediently followed Zhang Xin's arrangement and entered the driving school.

The timing is a bit awkward. It's the summer break for the F1 season, which coincides with summer vacation in China. Most driving schools are already overcrowded, and it's not guaranteed that you can secure a test slot in the system.

Besides college students who were kicked out of school because they were idle at home, many prospective college students who have just finished the college entrance examination and received their results will also choose to obtain the professional certificates that they will likely use most frequently in their lives during this least stressful time.

In such situations, it is common for most students to be in groups of seven or eight, or even more than ten, with one instructor per car.

It is said that Shu Long's mother also spent a considerable sum of money to get the driving school to "reluctantly" arrange a VIP car for Shu Long, which supposedly had the best instructors, few students, and a fast track to the second stage of the driving test.

　Thank you to Zailan, SiLentQ, Zhirexiamu, Li Xiaoyao, Grifin, Wuguanfengyue, Manyouzhe i, Book Friend 20170201161134657, and Feiyang Xiaoyang for the monthly tickets.

　　Thank you Ffortress for the generous donation.

　　I'm thinking of just creating a group chat so I'd have a place to chat while watching games, but I'm also worried it might affect my mindset.

　　You can also share any plot ideas you have here. Of course, I may not listen to them, because I have a relatively clear long-term story structure from beginning to end. If I make any changes in the middle, it might fall apart.

　　However, one's brainpower is limited. Although I have been very careful in connecting the logical lines in the middle, there may still be small bugs in the details.

　　Moreover, in certain minor details, you might be able to copy some interesting ideas from other members of the group.

　　I wonder if it would be awkward if no one added me at all, making me seem like I was just imagining things.
　　
　
(End of this chapter)