Last Man Standing

Chapter 14

A new chapter on this lovely Saturday. 

Also, for everyone who didn't know yet and would like to be there: Prema is doing the annual Prema party online this year and with the information out there right now, we could all join. 

Second race weekend

Hanoi street circuit, Vietnam
Friday

Qualifying

"Okay Mary, so we are just going to go for it now, we know what you can do now, so give us a show." Marylinde confirmed the message over the radio and smiled. That morning she had set the fastest lap of the session by three tenths to the driver in second place, Callum Ilott. He had been fuming jokingly as he kept saying how disappointed he was in himself for letting a rookie beat him in a training session. It gave the 'wrong' impression. They had laughed and spent the rest of the morning together at Haas, where Callum had taken the role of reserve driver for the season. It was all they could give him after such a strong season, for there were no empty seats to fill. At least, not yet.

Marylinde took a deep breath as she rounded the final corner to start her final flying lap. She was currently in p2, but with people improving their times left right and centre as the track kept improving, purple sectors were pulled out of cars everywhere. Now it was Marylinde's turn to do so.

She firmly pressed her foot onto the throttle as she hurdled down the straight. She braked as late as she could into the first corner without compromising her exit and tried to remember herself to keep breathing all throughout the lap. Shift, breathe. Brake, breathe. She was so focussed, she almost forgot how to, giving it her all. The walls of the circuit came close at a couple of occasions, but Marylinde never took it too for and therefore completed the lap with two purple seconds.

"That's pole position for now Mary!" Mary cheered softly, knowing that she was one of the final drivers to start a timed lap, but not the last, so someone could still beat her time.

"Who's yet to complete the lap?"

"Mazepin, Lundgaard and Ilott."

"Damnit, how are their sectors?"

"All green, except Armstrong, he has started with a purple, then green and-" Marylinde expected Marcus to cross the line right about then, seeing the team stopped talking. "A final purple one, that's p2 Mary, a shame Armstrong just chipped it away from you. Forty-three thousandths separating the two of you. Ilott is about to finish his lap as well, he's the final one." It was at least p3. After the previous weekend, Marylinde was very happy with that result, though compared to the training session, it was a bit of a disappointment. She had finished two tenths ahead of p2.

"And?"

"Armstrong got pole, just under one tenth away from you. So that's p3. Job very well done."

"Damnit, so close, but thanks for the good car guys, it felt amazing. On to tomorrow. Try to get the big points. Today was only four."

"That's the spirit."

"Where's Mick?"

"Mick finished p6." Marylinde confirmed the message and nurtured the car back to the pit lane to stop in front of the Red Bull garage. They had joked about it, she and Alex seeing it just so happened to be the team she was a test driver for.

"Now you get an early experience of how it feels to drive away from the pit box, in a couple of weeks you'll get to experience driving out of it." Marylinde had laughed, knowing very well that she was going to get to drive the Red Bull in Spain for the first time in her life. She had tried to delay it for a race, so she'd get to drive it around Monaco, but the team had refused. It would be her first time driving in Monaco all together and thought it to be better to do so in her own formula two car rather than an expensive formula one car. The chance of accidentally crashing it too big.