Chapter 143 - 66: Yes! Yes! Yes!

Chapter 143: Chapter 66: Yes! Yes! Yes!

Now, Jordan King’s situation became even more difficult.

Jack was practically glued to his tail, while O’connor boldly dove into the inside line that Jordan had left open. Not to be outdone, Lucas followed O’connor’s lead, though his speed dropped much faster.

The group exited the corner almost simultaneously. However, carrying too much speed mid-corner, O’connor was forced to run wide to ensure he had enough space to complete his exit. As a result, Jordan was continuously squeezed on the outside until he reached the right-side barrier. With nowhere left to go, he had to tap his brakes to avoid being hit by the still-drifting O’connor.

Unfortunately, it was unclear whether O’connor still hadn’t regained control of his car or if he was deliberately continuing to push outward.

CRASH!

His rear tire collided with Jordan’s front tire. O’connor’s car bounced into the air before landing back down, still able to drive normally. However, the impact instantly snapped the left front suspension of Jordan’s car. Had his corner exit not been slow enough, his car would have undoubtedly spun out of control.

In the brief window of their collision, Lucas and Jack seamlessly slipped right past them. The chain reaction involving the five cars at Turn Two unfolded in a mere instant. The situation was so chaotic that the commentators struggled to find the words to describe it.

Alan TR: "Caution, yellow flag."

Wu Shi TR: "Copy that."

He couldn’t believe there was another yellow flag. It was a godsend! Because he had pulled a gap on the straight, he had no idea—nor did he care—that this was actually a chain reaction caused by his earlier maneuver. But his joy didn’t even last two seconds before the trackside Matthew waved the green flag again.

Wu Shi TR: "What’s the situation?"

Alan TR: "Jordan’s car can still coast. He’s going to roll to the pit entrance himself, so there’s no need to deploy Matthew to push the car or send out a crane."

Hearing this, Wu Shi fell silent. He knew that at this point, his only option was to close the gap with the guy ahead.

Due to the switch to wet tires and the slippery track surface, everyone’s lap times had generally dropped to around fifty-three seconds. However, Verstappen at the front of the pack was still maintaining a lap time of around fifty to fifty-one seconds, quickly pulling away from the main group.

Wu Shi, of course, was no slouch either. He was the only one who had managed to keep up with Verstappen. Two laps later, he seemed to have closed the distance a bit, but the rain was steadily growing heavier. The massive spray kicked up by Verstappen’s car completely obliterated his line of sight.

Faced with these conditions, he had no choice but to proceed with extreme caution.

Right at that moment, Alan spoke over the TR, "Only six minutes left until the race ends."

Races were measured by either time or laps. When delays made it impossible to complete the remaining laps, the race would be terminated based on the time limit.

Wu Shi TR: "Yep, I know. How much faster am I per lap compared to him?"

Alan TR: "0.1 to 0.3 seconds."

Wu Shi calculated silently in his head: six minutes meant roughly twelve laps. He was currently 1.8 seconds behind Verstappen. At this rate, he would catch up by the ninth lap, leaving him with only three laps to launch an attack.

"Oh! This is unbelievable! Verstappen and Wu Shi’s lap times still haven’t shown any significant drop! They are fighting tooth and nail to maintain a pace of around fifty-one seconds, while Lucas, currently in third, is only clocking fifty-four point one-two-one seconds!"

The commentator was in utter disbelief. The two leaders were pulling away at a staggering rate of two to three seconds per lap faster than the rest of the field!

After his initial shock, he added, "Race Control has issued a penalty to O’connor. He will have to serve a drive-through penalty for his earlier maneuver. I’m afraid he’s out of contention for the championship in this race."

As the rain poured down harder, the drivers at the back grew increasingly cautious. However, with the standing water on the track growing ever deeper, drivers were still constantly spinning out.

Wu Shi didn’t dare trail directly behind Verstappen at this point. For one, visibility was genuinely abysmal. Secondly, he knew perfectly well how he had just dispatched Jordan King. Under these conditions, with zero visibility when trailing another car, he could easily guess that Verstappen would pull the exact same trick on him.

This stemmed not only from his understanding of Verstappen, but also from Verstappen’s understanding of him—Verstappen fully believed that, even under these horrendous conditions, Wu Shi could maintain absolute control of his car and avoid a collision.

Wu Shi felt a sarcastic urge to thank Verstappen for his unwavering trust.

Verstappen TR: "What’s his lap time?"

Engineer TR: "51.263."

Verstappen TR: "Why?! How is he faster than me? How is it possible for him to drive this fast when he can’t even see the track?!"

Faced with Verstappen’s frantic questioning, the engineer had no answer.

Alan TR: "Verstappen is asking how you’re maintaining your lap time when you clearly shouldn’t be able to see anything."

Wu Shi TR: "I talked with Hamilton once. He told me that when you can’t see anything, just count the seconds. You’ll know exactly when to brake, even if you can’t see the corner at all."

Alan TR: "..."

Wu Shi was obviously just talking nonsense. While it was true that some drivers had claimed to do this, relying on it was practically treating one’s life as a joke. After all, racing speeds constantly fluctuated. How could anyone guarantee absolute precision down to fractions of a second?

The real reason he could maintain this pace wasn’t because he possessed piercing vision that could see through the spray, but because he could calculate his driving distance based on his tire rotations. It was a task that consumed an immense amount of mental bandwidth, which was why he spoke far less than usual, especially when approaching the Great Straights.

Even so, this method still couldn’t produce the absolute fastest racing line. On a rainy day, the optimal track layout was never static. The hallmark of elite drivers in Rain Battles, aside from their superior ability to keep their cars stable compared to average drivers, was their knack for hunting down the spots on the track with the highest grip.

Verstappen’s racing lines looked more or less the same, but in reality, there were subtle variations every single lap. These variations were the physical manifestation of his relentless search for grip.