Chapter 63: Chapter 60: Virtually No Weaknesses
Chen Xiangbei took a quick shower and changed into clean clothes before walking out, just in time to see two burly Huasi Sports technicians pushing the CFR2000 back to the garage for inspection.
During his previous drive, he was quite dissatisfied with the mechanical performance of this CFR2000 racing car, and thought it would be a good opportunity to adjust it together with the technicians.
"Hello, I don’t know how to address you two?"
Chen Xiangbei went over to greet them since Liang Chi hadn’t introduced their names before, only mentioning that they were his apprentices, so he had no idea what to call them.
Upon hearing Chen Xiangbei’s voice, the two Huasi technicians paused their work. The round-faced technician on the left introduced himself with a silly grin, "My name is Feng Yong, you can just call me Ah Yong."
"He’s called Zhao Lei, older than us, and he’s generally referred to as Brother Lei in the team."
"Okay, you can also call me Xiangbei."
Chen Xiangbei nodded with a smile, before asking, "Ah Yong, Brother Lei, do you know how to tune the car?"
Tuning and repairing a car are two different concepts, especially with formula racing cars, which also involve aerodynamics. Without asking clearly, Chen Xiangbei couldn’t guarantee the others knew how to do it.
"We do. We used to assist Ford technicians, and after their contract ended in the middle of the year and they withdrew, the base cars have been tuned by us in collaboration with Honda engineers."
"That’s good."
Chen Xiangbei acknowledged and squatted in front of the CFR2000, pointing at the suspension first: "The spring damping is a bit too stiff. While stiff springs increase cornering support, they reduce the car’s traction, making high-speed bends more prone to skidding."
For ordinary people or most "low-level" drivers, they often prefer the feel of stiff springs as they can suppress body roll at high speeds around corners, giving them more cornering confidence.
But Chen Xiangbei’s confidence comes not from an illusory sense of touch, but from the real car feel feedback from the track, allowing him to discern the speed limit around corners, where too hard spring damping can be counterproductive.
"Also, the brake balance adjustment is wrong. A 50:50 front-to-rear brake ratio is not suitable for dry conditions, as the rear wheels are more prone to locking up. It’s better to adjust it to 55:45."
"Furthermore, the suspension camber angle is off, which can lead to insufficient contact patch on the outside tires during cornering."
While Chen Xiangbei was continuously providing feedback on race car tuning, Ito Masashi, having finished tidying up the control console equipment, returned and happened to see this scene, freezing on the spot.
The Chinese newcomer not only started driving the formula car directly but can also tune the car?
It’s well known that many F1-level drivers aren’t necessarily adept at car tuning and often rely on shared tuning data from the team or teammates.
Where did Chen Xiangbei learn all this professional knowledge?
"Xiang Bei, have you really never raced karts or driven a formula car before?"
Ito Masashi, filled with curiosity, came over and asked.
If getting accustomed to the formula car could be explained by simulators or innate talent, the ability to provide feedback on car tuning was truly beyond Ito Masashi’s cognitive understanding.
"No."
Chen Xiangbei calmly denied it.
"If you’ve never driven them, how can you tune a car?"
"Does driving karts or entry-level formulas teach you how to tune cars?"
Instead of directly answering Ito Masashi’s question, Chen Xiangbei responded with a question of his own.
In an instant, Ito Masashi was even more puzzled, unable to respond.
The reason is simple: kart racers or entry-level formula drivers generally don’t reach the threshold of car tuning capability.
Yet, a more "alarming" reality follows—Chen Xiangbei, as a purely new driver, has actually reached the threshold of car tuning!
Seeing Ito Masashi almost overheating from thinking, Chen Xiangbei chuckled and proactively provided a relatively reasonable explanation.
"Ito, I’ve always worked part-time at Uncle Liang’s repair shop, where he taught me a lot of professional knowledge about car tuning."
While it’s true Chen Xiangbei worked part-time at a repair shop, Liang Chi never actually taught him about car tuning, but the two of them likely wouldn’t verify this—the key was exploiting an information gap.
Upon hearing Chen Xiangbei’s explanation, a look of sudden realization appeared on Ito Masashi’s face.
With half of Liang Chi being a racing engineer and half a chief technician at Huasi Sports, he is indeed proficient in car tuning. It seems that Chen Xiangbei, like the two Huasi technicians, is also his apprentice.
"Xiang Bei, being able to tune a car provides a great advantage in formula racing events. Keep it up, and I believe you will create miracles just like Sato."
With increasing understanding, Ito Masashi became more and more appreciative of Chen Xiangbei. Apart from the disadvantage of age, this rookie driver had no shortcomings!
After saying this, Ito Masashi directly joined the car-tuning team, embodying the ancient Chinese saying of "mutual understanding and shared ambitions," showing how a racing team often needs mutual appreciation and recognition to be cohesive.
Soon after, Technical Director Miyamoto Shigeru also entered, and seeing the car tuning scene, he showed a complex expression on his face.
As the technical director who participated in the development of the CFR2000, he knew very well that this car had many design flaws that cannot be changed through test drives and tuning.
This is why Miyamoto Shigeru recommended Chen Xiangbei to move to a higher level of Renault Formula, because it wasn’t worth wasting more time on a failed product.
However, Miyamoto Shigeru did not stop Chen Xiangbei and the others from their "futile efforts," because in a sense, car tuning is a process of integration between the driver and the team, regardless of whether Ito Masashi or he himself would still be part of Chen Xiangbei’s team after the contract expires.
At least for now, everyone is still one team!
Time passed in this process of integrating and familiarizing with each other, and in the afternoon, Chen Xiangbei was brought alone by Lu Xiaoman to the base gym, where she would act as a trainer to help formulate a fitness training plan.
Formula drivers, including those in F1, actually engage in extensive daily physical training, with intensity definitely not losing out to many common sports.
Because formula racing isn’t just about technical skills, it’s also a physically demanding job.
Without going into details about g-forces, just in terms of strength requirements alone, an ordinary person might find it hard to imagine that an F1 driver needs as much as 30 kilograms of force to turn the steering wheel at high speeds.
If you still can’t comprehend, think of a household water jug weighing 18.9 kilograms. If you can lift two such jugs and exercise them up and down for one or two hours, you might get a sense of what it’s like for an F1 driver to handle a whole race.
Moreover, the car shakes during driving, and hitting curbs feels much like crossing speed bumps, creating scenes where the entire car "jumps."
An F1 driver must ensure that the steering wheel remains perfectly steady under any circumstance, or else at speeds of two or three hundred kilometers per hour, any instability could result in a crash against the wall.
Basically, every F1 driver has an extremely stable core strength and a pair of strong arms!
Besides that, formula drivers also need a pair of "Wind God Legs," because the brake pedal, when pressed with full force, can reach an astounding 200 kilograms.
If you don’t have enough leg strength, you may barely be able to press the brakes, and the track would be full of potential rear-end collisions.
So professional racing is far from being as easy as it looks, and definitely not as leisurely as cruising around in a regular car.
To succeed in entering the highest echelon of formula racing, F1, talent is only the admission ticket to visiting the gods; within the circuit, among the 20 strongest drivers in the world, who isn’t a one-in-a-million genius?
Forget about F1, even reaching F2, it’s often rare for a single country to produce one.
You have to make ten times or a hundred times the effort to have a chance to compete with them on talent!
PS: Brothers, we’re on the Sanjiang cycle PK, keep up with the last few days of persistent reading!