It's a pity that Chen Xiangbei never raced as an F1 driver in his past life.

However, he's lost count of how many laps he's run on the racing simulator.

When the familiar scene of the East Sea International Circuit appeared before his eyes, Chen Xiangbei began racing the Brawn GP car in the simulator.

Ross Brown stood with his arms crossed, watching Chen Xiangbei's simulated driving with a casual attitude. In his eyes, a rookie driver at Renault level running laps was akin to children playing house.

After all, Ross Brown is part of the legendary trio with Schumacher!

But a hint of surprise flashed in Ross Brown's eyes; he could see the smooth and fluent lines Chen Xiangbei was taking, which absolutely wasn't the skill level of a newbie just touching a racing simulator.

"Staler, has Xiangbei driven a racing simulator before?"

"Yes, he was a trainee at the Honda Racing Academy."

Hearing Staler's response, Ross Brown had a sudden realization.

No wonder Chen Xiangbei was so proficient in setting the parameters and was familiar with the East Sea International Circuit.

It seems during his time at the Honda Racing Academy, he ran a lot on this home track in China.

However, Ross Brown quickly became aware of a problem—that Chen Xiangbei, as a rookie Renault driver and an older newcomer, hasn't been in touch with simulators for long.

In the limited practice time, he's supposed to simulate driving the Renault car. Where would he find the energy to skillfully operate an F1 car?

Even if Chen Xiangbei took a unique path by using his valuable simulation time to practice controlling an F1 car.

The issue is that the complete data for the BGP001 car was only obtained during a private test a few days ago, and only input into the simulator yesterday.

The fully functional BGP001 car hasn't been simulated by the two official drivers of the team, let alone Chen Xiangbei having any chance to touch it.

How does it feel like the Chinese kid is quite adapted? Could his talent really be so high, and Staler and Odetto weren't exaggerating at all?

At this point, no one could answer Ross Brown's questions. He saw that Chen Xiangbei had already finished his first lap, dynamically starting and pushing full throttle for the fastest timed lap.

If Chen Xiangbei's smooth corner cutting line had already amazed Ross Brown before, now the speed that Chen Xiangbei was displaying was downright astonishing.

It's important to know that a rookie driver at Renault level, even controlling an F1 car on a simulator, experiences a completely different driving sensation.

Let alone speeding full throttle on the track, being able to start normally and slowly finish a lap can already be considered quite talented.

In most cases, hitting the accelerator and the car spinning in place would be nothing out of the ordinary.

Ross Brown could explain away Chen Xiangbei finishing the first lap using his experience with Honda simulators.

But the speed showcased when going full throttle now, let alone having driven a racing simulator, even asking a real F1 driver to simulate a never-before-driven BGP001 car would likely only achieve what Chen Xiangbei was showing.

What kind of joke is this? A Chinese newbie able to rival an F1 driver's adaptability?

Ross Brown couldn't believe it was true, even though he was personally witnessing it now. The event seemed more bizarre than Staler recommending Chen Xiangbei as a test driver.

Because this is downright at the level of an official driver!

Ross Brown stared intently at the simulator screen, feeling Chen Xiangbei's extremely smooth corner-cutting lines until the virtual BGP001 car zoomed past the starting line, displayed as 1:33.790 lap time on the screen.

Seeing this number, Ross Brown stood dumbstruck as if hit by lightning.

He vividly remembered the fastest lap record at the East Sea International Circuit, achieved during the Ferrari Dynasty in 2004, run by Schumacher with a time of 1:32.238.

Chen Xiangbei's lap time was only 1.5 seconds slower than Schumacher's record.

In the F1 realm, a 1.5-second gap is actually substantial, but the merit of a performance depends on the comparison objects.

One was run by the King of Cars, Schumacher, driving a Ferrari, while the other was by Renault rookie Chen Xiangbei, using BGP001 test data for his second lap result.

If Ross Brown's memory serves correctly, among the four rookie drivers who joined F1 last year, only Vettel had a lap speed at the East Sea International Circuit faster than Chen Xiangbei, while the other three rookies didn't achieve such a simulation speed.

Is it the simulator malfunctioning or are my eyes deceiving me?

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.