#I appreciated it so so much | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

racingliners · 9 months

Text

Life In The Fast Lane - Chapter 14: 2023 Race 11 Hungary

Rating: Teen & Up

Warnings: None apply

Pairings: Original Female Character(s)/Original Male Character(s); OFCs & OMCs

Work Tags: Re-write of a previous work; not beta read; dual/multiple pov; mentions of IRL current and past F1 figures; Eventual romance; friends to lovers; found family/work family; actual family; occasional swearing; racing drivers and their various shenanigans; how to handle pressure (and how not to); with a sprinkling of the power of friendship; tags will be updated as work progresses

Chapter 14/57 Word count: 7.3k Summary: You never forget your first

Friday 28th July – Hungaroring, Budapest

Martin never had his eyes or heart set on management when he joined McLaren all those years ago. He’d started out as a press officer, which granted did require good people skills. When he’d been promoted to Head of Communications, it meant interacting with more of the then-management – and he’d unintentionally impressed them all. When it had been put to Martin that the board had him in mind for the team principle position, he had done everything he could to bolster his knowledge of the other departments. He had lunch with mechanics, sat in on engineer’s meetings, he’d even gone to the wind tunnel on more than one occasion to see how R&D worked in person.

It meant that he was prepared as he could be when he’d been promoted to team principal over six years ago. It had been quite the challenge to manage a championship winning season in his very first year – but the same thing was said for Nathan who was in his rookie season. And they won both titles that year.

Though, as it was said by so many in the paddock, in F1 you learn more when you lose as opposed to when you win. Which was why this season in particular was proving to be Martin’s most challenging by far.

Team morale fluctuated with the pace of the car – which seemed to change every weekend. Sophie’s podium hadn’t quite been a false dawn, if anything it proved to everyone that they could achieve success if everything fell into place. But luck was always so difficult to find in motorsport.

Martin found himself sat in-between Edward Morden and Charlotte Stewart from Mercedes in the Team Principle’s press conference on Friday afternoon, about an hour after the end of FP2. Edward was smug following both Schmitz’s win in Germany two weeks ago, and with Red Bull’s pace in both practice sessions. Charlotte by contrast was playing her cards very close to her chest – even though every other team in the paddock had ran the numbers and knew that Mercedes were at worst going to be on par with Red Bull over one lap and in the race.

“Question for Martin,” An advantage of being a former press officer was that journalists, no matter how hard they tried, never phased him – as one of the writers from the BBC asked the first question from the floor. “McLaren’s pace has looked the best it has in practice probably for the first time since China. Do you think the upgrades you introduced in Germany have paid off? Or is it because James and Sophie are both very familiar with the Hungaroring and know how to get the most out of it?”

“Truthfully, I think it’s a combination of both. James won here last year, as did Sophie in both F2 races. But also the data we got from the last race in Germany was very promising. Even though it was a wet race, we could still see some good gains in our performance. And coming into this weekend we knew that this track would be much better for us.”

In both practice sessions the team hadn’t just managed to get both cars into the top ten, but James and Sophie had one top five lap time apiece between them – and the engineers knew there were still potential gains on the table. Though it was starting to look like that their race pace was going to be much closer to the cars ahead compared to their quali runs. More than a few things would have to fall into McLaren’s favour if they wanted to think about a race win.

“Even if you do get one or both cars on the podium come Sunday, is it not just a sticking plaster for what has been by your own admission a very unsuccessful season by McLaren’s standards?” The next journalist asked. Martin hummed, and very carefully thought out and picked his words.

“Well, we’ve all said multiple times that this isn’t where we want to be. We want to be in the fight for the championship. And we have gone a bit wrong in terms of our car design, though we still have positives over our rivals that are still working well for us. But in a season like this you can’t think about how you would like your results to be, you have to ensure that you and the team are taking the maximum potential out of every single race weekend. At one race that might be fifth, at the next it could be a race win or podium finish. And you have to also ensure that you are there to capitalise on the cars around you making mistakes,” He paused to clasp his hands on the table in front of him.

“Every single person inside the garage and back at Woking is working incredibly hard to deliver the best results we can. And we also have a fantastic driver line-up with James and Sophie, who have been working brilliantly together and bringing home some great points for the constructors championship when they’ve had the opportunity. As long as we learn something from every weekend to carry us forward, then that to me right now is all that matters.”

It wasn’t quite the answer the journalist had wanted, and it also wasn’t quite what the board would have wanted him to say – which meant it was the absolute best answer Martin could give.

Once the press conference was finally over, he and Charlotte quickly made small talk before wishing each other well for the weekend. And as he walked back into the paddock with Katie, he put on a brave face for all to see. McLaren might be down on form, but they certainly hadn’t lost their ability to fight.

Saturday 29th July

“Come on…” Sophie groaned, her eyes fixed on one of the many TV screens broadcasting the F2 sprint race. “Come on, come on, come on,” She repeated under her breath, on the off-chance it would somehow will Julian on to hold on to third place, and get his first podium of the season.

Julian’s parents hadn’t been able to get the time off to fly out to Hungary, so Mark and Mary had gone down to the support paddock in their place, proudly fulfilling their Aunt and Uncle duties. It meant that Sophie had been alone at a table in the motorhome for the start of the race, though her loud cheer when Julian passed two cars on the first lap had caught Richard’s attention and he’d ended up joining her.

“Who’s leading?” A voice, Chris’ Sophie recognised after a second, asked as he leaned against the table. Sophie let out a small groan in reply, her eyes too closely fixed on the running order on the side of the screen as the cameras cut away to one of the bright red Premas. She had went from watching sat down to being stood up perched against the table about two laps into the race.

“Virtanen, there’s eight laps left,” Richard said quietly, not that there was any commentary for Sophie to listen to. He didn’t say anything about Julian’s potential maiden podium, either because Chris already knew or because it was clear to both of them that Sophie was far more stressed than she should have been in the hours leading up to qualifying.

So instead of sitting down, Chris perched himself on the edge pf the table next to Sophie and placed a firm but reassuring hand on her shoulder.

“Which car is Julian in?”

“22.” Richard replied, joining his colleagues. He silently put an arm around Sophie’s shoulders while she continued to gnaw on her thumbnail.

Vanessa really had timed her phone call home at the worst possible moment. And Will was somewhere trackside taking pictures.

The laps trickled away, and at some point someone put two and two together and unmuted the TV as Heikki Virtanen started the last lap. Word must have gotten out that Julian was doing well, as a few people from PR had joined the gathering, alongside Aditya and Luke. Sophie found herself filled with familiar agony as her eyes continued to be glued to the timing intervals on the side of the screen, though she had never felt this bad watching Julian race before. Sophie briefly wondered if this was how her parents had felt every race day for the past sixteen years, and made a mental note to apologise.

As Virtanen crossed the finish line in first, the camera hung around long enough to see the second placed car, before immediately cutting to Julian’s navy blue Carlin as he meandered round the final few corners. Fourth place was seven tenths back. All Julian had to do was hold his nerve and he’d be on the podium.

It felt like everything happened at double speed. Julian brushed his car a little too close to the barrier at the final corner before he gently straightened the steering and accelerated down the start-finish straight, and was the third car to see the chequered flag.

Polite applause filled the air as Sophie let out a loud and completely undignified cheer before a few stray tears fell down her face as Richard and Chris squeezed her on both sides.

“I need to get to the support paddock, I have to see him.” The words flew out of Sophie’s mouth as she looked up at Richard. Out of the corner of her eye should could see Chris and Luke fixing Richard with a firm stare that said ‘Don’t you dare say no’.

“If we make a run for it we’ll catch the podium,” Richard said firmly, and turned towards the stairs.

“Tell Vanessa where I’ve gone!” Sophie shouted over her shoulder in the hope that someone would hear and she skipped down the silver steps after Richard and practically ran out the main doors, with a few people shouting congratulations after her.

They dashed into the pitlane, and not the support paddock. As the Hungaroring was so small that all the support categories and F1 had their ceremonies on the same podium. Richard stayed put in scrutineering while Sophie flashed her paddock pass at one of the marshals who let her into parc fermé. She instantly recognised her mechanics from last year and they all clapped each other on the back and shoulders as Sophie squeezed through the crowd to find her parents. She finally found them at the very front, pressed up against the barrier.

Eventually, the number 22 Carlin came into view, and Julian bounded out of the car the second he parked it at an alarming rate, making a beeline for his family. He threw his arms round Mark and Mary, both of whom were quite weepy, before he pulled Sophie into a near bone crushing hug.

“You fucking smashed it!!” She exclaimed as she patted her cousin’s black and chrome silver helmet. “I am so proud of you.”

“No pressure for tomorrow!” Julian was likely grinning under his helmet. Sophie just playfully screwed up her face as her cousin made his way round to see all of his mechanics before he had to almost be dragged over for his post-race interview.

Sophie took as many pictures and videos as she could of the podium ceremony, and she even managed to collect a few stray pieces of confetti which she stuffed into her pocket. They had just enough time to squeeze in a family picture with Julian and his trophy before Sophie had to go back to the motorhome to get ready for qualifying.

“Great job James!” It had been so long since Paul had something to cheer for that James almost didn’t believe just how delighted his race engineer sounded. “That is P6, we did just miss out on P5 by a couple of hundredths, but we know there’s pace in the car for tomorrow.”

“Good work everyone!” James replied, equal parts annoyed to miss out on a top five start by such a small margin, and relieved that he was at least within striking distance. “Where’s Sophie?”

“P4, about nine hundredths ahead.”

It had been the story for most of the weekend. Apart from FP1, Sophie had been faster than James in every single session. But at least they had managed to get both cars in the top ten for the second qualifying running. His disappointment about not being the lead car aside, it had been a good day for the team.

As he and Katie walked into the press pen, James realised that his shoulders hadn’t felt this light since Monaco. And all the journalists seemed to notice just how happy both McLaren drivers were with their performance. But, as they’d been told to by their press officers, they played down just how far up they could finish tomorrow. Even if McLaren and everyone else knew that their long run pace on Friday had been up there with Red Bull and Mercedes.

“How have you managed such a quick turn around?” James was asked in his final interview of the day.

“Well…” He huffed as he saw Sophie and Richard leave out of the corner of his eye. “Our upgrades in Germany have definitely helped, but I think it’s also that we were able to find the car’s performance window this week, which we’ve really struggled to do for most of the season. I think Martin said it quite well in that when these weekends happen, we have to do everything possible to capitalise on it. Hopefully one of us will be on the podium tomorrow.”

And as much as James liked Sophie, he wanted it to be him. Winning in Brazil last year felt so, so long ago. And while he had been putting his experience to good use in trying everything to help the team turn their fortunes around, he really wanted to get at least one trophy this year to show for it.

After a quick shower in the motorhome, James got changed and sprinted across the tarmac in the hope he would avoid any journalists as he went over to the engineering trucks for the post-quali debrief.

It was amazing what one decent session had done for morale. All the mechanics back in the garage had been beaming at the end of the session, and while most of the engineers already had their heads down looking at their laptops, those that weren’t all had smiles on their faces.

“Good job today Soph!” James called out as he made his way over to his seat. Sophie looked up, having been in deep conversation with Chris.

“Cheers, you too!” She grinned back, and the two team mates leaned over the tables to bump fists before sitting back down.

Chris and Sophie and resumed having their heads huddled together as they conversed and scribbled into their notebooks, the pair of them really were becoming quite the professional partnership. Eventually, once they were seemingly happy, Sophie dropped her pen on the desk and stretched out her fingers, her hand apparently cramped from all the writing.

“My God,” Paul mock gawked as he entered the room and walked over towards his driver with a steaming mug of tea. “You’re early”.

James rolled his eyes. Even in his title winning year he was never early for debriefs. Almost always on time and no more.

“First time for everything” James flashed a small smile as Paul sat down next to him and put on his radio headset.

Martin was the last to arrive, having not been so lucky in avoiding journalists on the way over.

“Alright everyone, all in all, given the car we have that was a brilliant qualifying session by everyone. Sophie, I promise to be the last person today to congratulate you on being the first female driver to qualify in the top five,” There was a pause as a few chuckles ran round the room, and through the headsets back at Woking.

“Thank you Martin.” James didn’t need to look to see that Sophie was blushing as Chris and Gary clapped her on the shoulder.

“But, while we are going to run simulations overnight, we know that we’re faster than Ferrari and almost on par with Red Bull and Mercedes on long run pace… there is a very good chance that we will be in contention for at least a podium tomorrow. Leena and Amir, why don’t you talk us through what the initial plan is for the race…”

Sunday 30th July

“So, you remember the strategy?” Chris asked once Sophie had jumped out of the car. It felt odd being back on the second row of the grid after so long, but she tried her best to just acknowledge it and move on. She couldn’t afford to get caught up in the occasion, not today. Not when a chance to be up on the podium again was there for the taking.

“Yeah,” Sophie nodded, and stepped in closer to her engineer in case there were any journalists floating around trying to listen in. “First stop for mediums. Then softs plan A and supers plan B to the end.”

“And don’t sing happy birthday to me on the formation lap okay? You’ve got a podium to get.”

“Okay…” Sophie playfully screwed up her face at Chris, who after the final briefing session had been presented with a very beautiful chocolate cake covered in fresh fruit in honour of his 38th birthday.

She knew that Chris just wanted Sophie to be completely focused on jumping cars at the start, since it was so hard to overtake around the Hungaroring. And she had no intention of doing anything else. Sophie just wanted to do something nice for her team mate, after all the hard work he’d done so far this year.

They spent as much time as they could talking about the track conditions, and any potential set-up tweaks Sophie would want or need, before she had to stand at the front of the grid for the national anthem. Her and Nico just about managed to squeeze in a good luck hug in which he told his friend to get at least on the podium, before he made the mad dash down to his slot in twelfth.

Could she win today? No one was really a hundred percent sure. The team’s aim was to simply get both cars as high up the order as possible. Not many race simulations had McLaren finishing on top as Martin would have liked. Sophie had to make gains at the start, as well as hopefully passing the surrounding cars either at the pit stops or on track, for there to be a chance of the team pulling it off.

Though some pundits, did have McLaren as optimistic outsiders.

Sophie and Vanessa bumped fists as the car was lowered onto the ground, and Steve did his now traditional pat of the car’s nosecone before everyone ran to the sides of the track, as the grid pulled away for the formation lap.

Remember to watch Carotti at the start. Chris’ words played back in Sophie’s mind as she exited the final corner, and slowly pulled up into her slot on the grid. She quickly glanced at the bright red Ferrari adjacent to her, and Benedikt’s dark blue Red Bull in front.

You’ve done this before, just keep it clean going into turn one. Sophie told herself, as the five red start lights illuminated one by one.

As soon as the lights went out, she released the clutch and pressed firmly on the accelerator pedal. Herself and the top three had all made good starts as they headed for turn one, and all four of them broke for the corner in quick succession, with Sophie being the last in the hope of taking Giovanni’s place. And while Sophie neatly clipped the apex, the red Ferrari was still alongside her as they made the approach for turn two. Sophie was forced to take the outside line, but she held firm knowing that it would become the inside for turn three if she had enough of her car ahead.

So she broke slightly later again, and swept her McLaren round the curve of turn two far enough that her front axle was in line with Carotti’s front wing, allowing Sophie to come out of turn three on the racing line – and in third place.

“Yes!” She hissed inside her helmet, and quickly switched her focus to Benedikt who hadn’t completely shot off down the track as he pursued Nathan’s Mercedes.

“Great job Sophie, we are racing the cars ahead, just keep your head down.” Chris as ever was almost icy cool over the radio as Sophie drove through the second sector. “Excellent pass at turn two.” Though it wasn’t hard to hear his smile from the cockpit.

“Let’s get this podium!” She radioed back before braking for the sequence of last three corners that led back onto the start-finish straight.

The first stint of the race was always going to be a case of each team holding their nerve to see who would pit first. That, and the super softs weren’t predicted to have a great performance window given the hot weather, so all each pit wall could do was tell their driver to keep going either until a gap in the traffic appeared, or one of them blinked first.

From Sophie’s perspective, the car had felt the best it had all season. Just like in practice she was able to carry better speed through the corners than the cars around her. She didn’t know if it would be enough to win, but she was damn well going to try.

“Okay Soph, box opposite Schmitz. Box opposite Schmitz.” Chris radioed in at the start of lap 18.

“Copy.” Benedikt’s Red Bull was barely two seconds ahead of her, he had been faster on the super soft tyres but not by much. Their lap times had only been a tenth or two within each other.

Sophie pushed a little bit harder round the track in case it ended up being her in lap, and she closed the gap to Benedikt by a few tenths, and when she saw him speed out of turn 13 and stay on the racing line, she veered right when she made her way out of the same corner and dived into the pits. The pit crew had been ready and waiting with a new set of mediums just in case. And it felt like a near-perfect stop as the red-banded tyres were swapped for white, and Sophie barely had time to peel off one of her visor tare-offs before she was away again.

“Okay, out lap is critical. Let’s get him.” It was a safe assumption that Red Bull would pit Ben on the next lap to cover her stop, so Sophie was more than a little annoyed when she saw two cars on her left as she came out the pits. Thankfully she managed to out brake them for turn one and found herself out in clean air as she pushed hard to both get the tyres up to temperature, and hopefully make up the time difference to jump Benedikt whenever he stopped.

“Schmitz is in,” Chris radioed again as Sophie drove out of turn 12. “Give it everything you’ve got.”

She attacked the final sector as if it was a quali run, and while a small part of her worried about what tyre life she would have at the end of her stint, Sophie hoped that it had been enough as she accelerated down the main straight to start lap 20.

“You got him! We are net P2, Watkins is still to stop.” As Sophie accelerated out of turn 1, she could just about see the navy blue Red Bull in her mirrors.

Nathan retained the lead once the rest of the top ten had made their first stops, with Sophie holding strong in second and Benedikt in third. James had gotten up to fourth by lap 25, and both McLaren’s were running well on the mediums. They weren’t faster than the Red Bull and Mercedes around them, but they were matching them. Which for now was enough.

For every lap time Chris asked for, Sophie delivered. And she found herself in a sort of no-man’s land with Nathan four seconds up the road and Benedikt five seconds behind when the Virtual Safety Car was deployed on lap 37.

“James has had a run in with one of the lapped cars, he’s stopped at turn 5 and there’s a bit of debris on track, be careful.” The message wasn’t what Sophie had wanted to hear on two counts. The first and most obvious was her team mate’s safety, and second it meant that any chances of the team getting a double podium (which had been on the cards had things fallen McLaren’s way) had just gone up in a confetti of carbon fibre. They both knew how much it would have meant to every single person in the garage and back at Woking to have such a good result after the season they’d had thus far.

“Is he out the car?”

“Yes, James is fine,” Chris replied, still sounding incredibly cool and composed. “Just stay focused, remember your VSC delta.”

Sophie briefly thought of her family stood with Richard and Vanessa at the back of the garage, and just as quickly snapped herself out of it. She couldn’t lose focus now.

“How are the tyres feeling?”

“Good, no graining from what I can tell.”

“Copy,” Chris likely paused to either scribble in his notebook or pass the information on to Leena and Amir. “We want you to stay out for now and keep track position.”

Had they been at a different circuit, the plan likely would have been to pit under the VSC and go to the end of the race. But none of the cars around Sophie seemed to be doing that, so she took in a deep breath and exhaled instead of questioning the team’s strategy call. She had to trust the pit wall to make the right decisions as much as they had to trust Sophie to keep the car on the road.

She hammered her foot down on the accelerator pedal when the VSC ended after three laps, and thanks to the fact that she had been exiting the final corner and Nathan had been braking for turn one, she closed the gap to him by just over a second.

The sun had remained high in the sky the entire race, with the crystal blue scattered with small fluffy clouds that hadn’t gone away by lap 50, when Nathan pitted for his final stop – and Sophie took the lead of the race.

Chris told her to push, but not that she’d be coming in at the end of the lap. Plan A plus five was what he’d told her over the radio a few laps ago. So she tried to recall everything she’d learned throughout the weekend thus far and gave the next few laps hell, trying to eke out every single millisecond of lap time she could find. It would be marginal, with Nathan on fresh tyres doing the exact same thing to avoid being overcut. And when Sophie started lap 55 in the pit lane, her worn out mediums exchanged for a fresh set of yellow-walled soft tyres, she wasn’t completely sure if it had been enough.

When she drove out of the pit lane, she saw Nathan’s Mercedes breeze through turn one.

“I know you’re frustrated, but the race is going to come to us at the end. You have fresher tyres. You can do this.”

It was funny how Chris just knew that Sophie would be upset at not coming out in the lead. She was a racing driver, so of course it was in her nature. But it was the way in which he knew exactly how to keep Sophie focused. Look at the bigger picture, see the positives. There was still a chance, however big or small, that she could win.

“Where’s Schmitz?”

“P1, but he’s yet to make his final stop. He’s bleeding time on his old mediums he won’t be a threat.”

Sophie wasn’t sure if the assessment needed to be so brutal, but it got the point across.

Her tyres were up to temperature by the end of the lap, and she just about saw on her pit board that she had fifteen laps remaining. And crucially, she hadn’t lost sight of Nathan at all. If anything, he looked a hair closer to her than before. She could even make out the splashes of Petronas teal on his sidepods as he turned right for the first corner.

With Sophie’s tyre advantage, it only took her five laps to get within Nathan’s DRS range, and the additional speed was more than welcome.

She briefly thought of her Dad again, and all the trophies he’d helped win back at the McLaren factory, and when James had happily showed them to her on that rainy day in April. But Sophie just as quickly put those memories in a box to deal with later.

Instead she reeled off all the potential places where she could overtake, and ended up with a very short list. The first three corners were her most realistic bet, which meant that as she broke for turn 2, her opportunity on that lap had already gone because she hadn’t been close enough to begin with.

Benedikt pitted at the start of lap 57, but only after Nathan and Sophie had to overtake him on track because of how slow he was on his old tyres. He hadn’t made it easy for either of them and they’d both lost time. Which considering that he was the championship leader, was probably the whole idea. Sophie exhaled any remaining frustration she had about the situation and fixed her attention back on Nathan’s Mercedes.

She was back within DRS range pretty quickly, and had closed down to within a few tenths of him even quicker. But then she found herself in the leading car’s dirty air, and while the regulations had been designed for cars to follow one and other closer than before, it still wasn’t going to be ideal to stay there forever.

“How much fuel do I have?” She asked Chris on lap 59.

“More than enough for now, keep pushing.”

Deep down Sophie knew that she didn’t have enough raw pace to get past him, but if she could stay close enough to either force Nathan to make a mistake, or take advantage of one, maybe, just maybe…

The start of lap 63 came, and with it, a small puff of white smoke from Nathan’s front right tyre as he broke for the first corner, and went slightly wide off his line as a result. This was it, maybe her one and only chance.

Sophie broke as late as she possibly dared and pulled up alongside the Mercedes at the apex of turn one. She was on the inside line which was very quickly going to become the outside of turn two as she activated her DRS, and very quickly glanced to her left.

Sophie respected Nathan, and he respected her back. He knew better than to force her off the circuit and while she was nowhere near as experienced in an F1 car as Nathan was, she knew not to go for a gap that wasn’t there.

So Sophie once again broke late for turn two, and planted her McLaren on the outside line, just like on the first lap. Her front axle was in-line with Nathan’s now, but she knew he would try and get to the apex of turn three first anyway.

But Sophie did, and took the lead of the race with it.

“Go, go, go!! Give it everything you have!” Chris almost shouted down the radio as Sophie drove up the hill toward turn four, as an almighty roar came from the grandstands at turn five.

Count the corners… just count the bloody corners.

The sweeping right hand of five, the right-left chicane of six and seven, the sharper turns of eight and nine-

“How far behind is he?”

“Two tenths, he’ll try to come back in the final sector and at turn one… just keep your head down Sophie.”

Head down. Count the corners. Don’t burn all the fuel. Watch the tyres. Eight laps left, if her maths was right.

Sophie could see Nathan clear as day in her mirrors as she swept round turns 13 and 14. And he was the one to have DRS this time going down the start-finish straight and on the run down to turn 2. But Sophie held her defensive live, and maintained the lead with seven laps left.

When there were six laps left, Nathan dropped back by another couple of tenths.

When there were five laps left, the gap between them was stuck at half a second. Sophie still had the fresher tyres, and while Nathan did absolutely have the better car, the lay of the track meant that he was struggling to do much with it other than chase.

But still he chased, employing the exact same tactics as Sophie used on him. Holding close, waiting for a mistake, while Sophie just kept on counting the corners.

With four laps left, the gap between them was just under six tenths of a second.

With three laps left, it was back down to five tenths.

Sophie didn’t have the headspace to think about what it would mean for her to win the race. About the message it would send not just to the whole paddock, but to the entire planet.

The penultimate lap came with no change between the two leading cars. Then finally, along came lap 70.

She made it through the first sector without any dramas, though Sophie didn’t have the best line through the chicane, which allowed Nathan to close up by another tenth. Turns 8 to 11 went past in a blur. And as she broke for turn 12, Sophie just about saw the corner of Nathan’s front wing hovering by her right rear tyre.

There were just two corners left, as Sophie focused on the track ahead instead of the car behind. She’d deliberately saved a tiny bit of energy from the battery in case she needed to make one final charge down the main straight.

The crowds were on their feet as Sophie turned left for 13, and after what felt like an age right for the long, sweeping turn 14.

She pressed hard on the accelerator, drained what was left of her battery, turned the fuel mix to maximum, and first saw all her orange clad mechanics pumping their fists through the gaps in the pit lane fence, and the chequered flag fluttering through the air almost in slow motion. It was like someone was stretching out the circuit, making the run to the finish line even longer.

But Nathan was still in her mirrors when Sophie crossed the finish line. First.

Muscle memory kicked in as she put the car into fuel saving mode and eased her foot off the accelerator pedal. Then she burst into tears.

“Sophie Knightsbridge…” Chris had to pause, he had an almighty lump in his throat by the sounds of things. “You’ve just won the Hungarian Grand Prix, you are a Formula 1 race winner!” Any remaining sense of decorum or professionalism had clearly gone out the window, as her race engineer shouted out of pure joy down the radio. “That was such an incredible drive… we are so, so proud of you.”

“You’ve just made history Sophie! Many, many congratulations. And also the second Knightsbridge to win with us.”

“Sophie that was an utterly brilliant drive! Well done from all of us.”

“As Chris would say, you little superstar. Congratulations Sophie.”

Martin, Leena and Amir all gave their congratulations over the radio as Sophie waved at as many marshals and fans in the grandstands as she could.

In her peripheral vision, she saw Nathan pull up alongside her and he gave Sophie an thumbs up from the cockpit.

“Remember your tyre pick up as well Soph.” Chris suddenly radioed in, sounding completely and utterly spent. “And take it all in my friend, you’ve more than earned it.”

“I don’t know what to say, I…” She drew in a shaky breath as more tears fell down her face. “Thank you so much to everyone who’s believed in me all these years. Martin for giving me a chance this year, my family…” Sophie had to cough away a heavy sob. “All of you on the pit wall, and everyone in the garage and back at Woking. I could not have done any of this without you. I love you all so much.”

Somehow, somewhere, she found the energy to cheer at the top of her voice. She wanted to bottle the moment up and carry it round with her forever.

“Oh,” A penny suddenly dropped in Sophie’s mind. “I hope this is an alright birthday present Chris.”

Her race engineer just laughed down the radio, and took a long pause.

“Please don’t sing,” He finally said as Sophie meandered her way through the second sector.

Right as Sophie joked that she barely had any energy left, a marshal who had been stood at the side of the track waving flags stepped out of formation, with some fabric clenched in their fist. As Sophie slowed down to take it, she recognised the stripes of the British flag.

When Sophie drove off she clutched half the flag in her left hand so it wouldn’t get caught in the airbox when she threw her fist into the air and let the rest of the fabric flutter in the breeze as Sophie slowly made her way back to the pits.

There was a whole line of marshals jumping and dancing around on the approach to turn 14, likely designed to direct any wayward drivers into the pitlane. And Sophie dropped the flag in her lap to have both hands back on the steering wheel so she could press the pit limiter button early.

The pit lane was always full with people at the end of the race, but today there was a colossal amount of photographers gathered at the pit lane entrance. So much so that a temporary barrier had been put up to keep them in place. All of them wanted to be the first to photograph the winner. The few remaining members on the Red Bull pit wall were both on their feet and applauding as Sophie drove past. But she burst into tears again at the sight of Leena, Amir and Leon forming a guard of honour with some of James’ engineers on the other side of the pit lane.

Everyone from Sophie’s side of the garage had gathered themselves in perc fermé. They were easy to spot – all right in front of the number 1 sign that Sophie just about managed to stop her car at. She switched off the car, and flicked up her visor to pinch the bridge of her nose, and right as she undid her seatbelt to get out of the car Nathan walked over to the orange McLaren, and crouched down by the cockpit. He reached a black gloved hand inside, and Sophie clasped it tightly.

“Congratulations!” He shouted through the lining of his helmet as he flicked up his own visor. “I haven’t enjoyed a fight like that in a long time.”

Sophie let out a small laugh through her happy tears.

“Listen, enjoy it okay? And don’t let anyone take this away from you.”

“I don’t plan to.” Sophie shouted through her helmet back.

“See you up there!” With a customary pat of her helmet, Nathan stepped away to see his own mechanics, allowing Sophie to jump out of her seat and carefully stand on top of her car with her fists raised aloft in the air as applause and raucous cheers were the only sounds she could hear.

Right at the front of the barriers were Sophie’s family, and she jumped off the car and made a beeline for their arms, hugging each and every one of them for as long as she could. She wanted to say that she loved them but the words kept on getting caught in her throat, so she just squeezed them all tightly and hoped it was enough.

“I’m so proud of you sweetheart,” Mark just about said through the tear stains on his cheeks. “We always knew you could do it love.”

Sophie went as high up on her toes as possible, and hugged her father tightly around the shoulders.

“Go, go see the others.” Mark said when he finally let his daughter go. And if Sophie’s mechanics had been cheering at the top of their voices in Shanghai, she briefly wondered if they would ever have any voices left as she made out Steve in the bubble of orange. Sophie hugged her number one mechanic while Aditya, Luke and Tommy all reached round to pat her helmet.

When Steve let go Sophie reached out for as many hands as she could, and only once she was certain she had seen everyone, she looked around for Vanessa and Richard.

Once again, Vanessa had planted herself just inside the scrutineering garage, and this time Richard was with her. Sophie’s face split into a wide grin as she sprinted towards her trainer and press officer, who both had their index fingers pointing to the sky forming the number one, and Sophie returned the gesture before stretching her arms out wide to hug them both.

“We did it!!!” Sophie finally found her voice again, and shouted for everyone to hear.

“You bloody smashed it!” Richard grinned. Poor Vanessa was too overwhelmed to speak and just hugged her driver and best friend tightly before jumping up and down with excitement. Once back on solid ground, Sophie went over to the scales to get weighed. And as she was finally stood still for more than a few seconds, she had the chance to remove her gloves, helmet and HANS device.

There had been multiple cameras following her the entire time, one was for the global TV feed and the others were photographers who were constantly snapping away in case the perfect shot magically happened in front of them. Sophie stayed stood on the scales regardless, and closed her eyes as she tried to steady her breathing. She pressed her free palm against her forehead and let a wide grin wash across her face.

Sophie jumped off the scales when she was told, and took the slip of paper from Pat Roberston, who congratulated her with a bright smile.

“Sophie!” Someone called out from the front of the open garage. Sophie whipped her head round, and beamed at Nico who sprinted towards his friend, and crushed her in the tightest hug he’d ever given her.

“I am so proud of you!” He exclaimed. “About fucking time.” He grinned as he ruffled his friends hair, already an FIA attendant was pushing Sophie towards the stairwell that led to the cool down room. “I love you!”

Sophie chuckled as Nico kissed the top of her head before he was directed over to the weigh scales.

“Love you too!” Sophie called back, and she turned to give one last cheer and fist bump in the air to her team before she pushed through the grey door, and headed for the podium.

* * *

2023 Hungarian Grand Prix Classification

1st - Sophie Knightsbridge (McLaren) - 25pts

2nd - Nathan Watkins (Mercedes) - 18pts

3rd - Benedikt Schmitz (Red Bull) - 15pts

4th - Cristóbal Vasquez (Alpine) - 12pts

5th - Giovanni Carotti (Ferrari) - 10pts

6th - Alistair Mitchell (Red Bull) - 8pts

7th - Aaron Jones (Aston Martin) - 6pts

8th - Teo Martinez (Ferrari) - 4pts

9th - Evan McKinley (Williams) - 2pts

10th - Nico Dumont (Alpha Tauri) - 1pt