That's Racing Baby | Lando Norris

Chapter 67: Race Seventeen

The lights begun to turn on and Emilia made her engine roar releasing the clutch when they went off. She pressed the throttle and slowly pushed it harder as she shifted up gears. Emilia moved left of Sergio getting the inside line of the corner. She broke late but was careful of shredding her front wing on someone else's car. Sergio was generous on the room he gave her and practically let her past. He attempted to go round the outside of her at turn three but he was unsuccessful. Emilia had a lot better traction out the corner.

Checo's tyres hadn't warmed up enough and neither had the other drivers around him so Emilia challenged Lewis into turn seven. Emilia had taken the inside line and knew she had very little room to squeeze through. Lewis had to concede the position and was now under threat from Checo. From then, there weren't any overtaking opportunities until turn fourteen. Emilia had the best traction out of turn thirteen with her tyres nearest the optimum. She needed this advantage as the other two cars were much faster than hers on the straights.

Emilia took the outside line which was the racing line trying to keep hold of her position. They were three wide into the corner and Emilia conceded a position to Lewis but stayed ahead of Checo who had squeezed Emilia into the wall though she still managed to get past. Behind Checo was no one. The five cars had split off already from the rest of the group. These tyres seemed to be paying off, so far.

Emilia was exhausted after that battle and felt very hot and needing a drink. She tried to take a sip from her drink tube but no water came. Emilia tried sucking a little harder but her mouth was still dry.

"John my drink tube is not working." Emilia stated.

"Having a look." John responded. Emilia waited for a fix to her problem. "Drink tube is not connected, Emilia you will not have the drink."

"Great thanks." Emilia huffed. This was the worst race for the team to have not connected her drink.

Of course, the tyres dropped off earlier than expected. Checo's had warmed up and he was mounting an attack against Emilia.

"Emilia how are the tyres feeling?" John asked.

"Not great at the moment."

"Plan A -2?" John suggested meaning Emilia would box at the end of this lap.

"Plan A -1." Emilia reasoned thinking she could make them last a bit longer. A lap could be the difference at the end of the race.

Emilia had practically no grip round turn thirteen and had to slow right down to avoid the wall as her tyres refused to turn her car. Checo had a brilliant exit as he still had grip. They sped down the straight side by side. Emilia was lacking trust in her tyres to make the corner so she broke earlier than normal hoping that Checo would make a mistake. Checo didn't and Emilia was right to brake earlier as she really struggled getting round the corner. Had she broke at the normal place, her car would be embedded in the wall at least this time she had only lost a proportion of her front wing.

"Box box." John decided.

"Copy." Emilia replied knowing her engineer was right. Though it was a debate whether she was going to make it to the pitlane. Driving without half a front wing and dead tyres was not easy. Emilia had to take it extra steady being surrounded by walls and ended up losing a lot of time. "Can you through an ice bucket or something over me when I pit because I'm really dehydrated. I need to cool down."

"We'll see what we can do." Emilia pitted for a tyre and front wing change staying still for longer than she wanted to before getting released. Her team listened to her wish and poured a bucket of ice into her cockpit and it felt amazing.

It was early to be pitting so Emilia came out in clean air able to put some laps in to jump the cars pitting later. However, she needed to save her tyres otherwise she would have no tyres towards the end.