This means that the F2 car of the future is actually closer to the handling experience of this era's F1 cars.

Although Chen Xiangbei fell at the doorstep of F1 in his past life, he made many efforts to cross this final step, including madly practicing on the simulator with the Catalonia and Bahrain circuits, hoping to seize the opportunity for a test drive.

However, compared to the immature youth training systems of this era, the selection criteria for various F1 teams in the future consider more of their own youth drivers, making it much harder to get slots and opportunities for external drivers.

But the effort was not in vain, the memory still exists.

This is why Chen Xiangbei can adapt so quickly to the F1 car and find the center line at full throttle through Turn 3.

As the old saying goes, Chen Xiangbei is not a pure rookie.

And his stronger talent in this life allows him shocking speed in getting the hang of the F1 car!

"Dong, is this Brown GP driver Bei really a rookie from China?"

The race engineer of the Renault Team, looking at the track footage and various sensor data, had disbelief written all over his face.

He believed in the existence of super rookies in this world, like Kimi Raikkonen.

But he did not believe that this newcomer would come from China, where there were no Formula cars!

News of Brown GP Team signing Chen Xiangbei as a test driver was heard by all teams in the F1 paddock.

But groups did not take it seriously.

The reason is simple; the thing about test drivers is that it seems high-level and carries the name of an F1 team.

In fact, there is a world of difference from official drivers, and there is no limit on slots; a team can sign as many as three or four if they wish.

The news of Ross Brown purchasing the Honda F1 Team being short of money was also well-known, and they all believed that this was a case of the Chinese driver Bei utilizing the "power of money," perfectly matching with the cash-strapped Ross Brown.

Now it seems, this might not be the case.

"I am sure that Bei is a pure rookie."

Dong Hebin, although an overseas Chinese, had participated in the Asian BMW Formula as a Chinese driver years ago, and had a clear grasp of the domestic development of formula sports.

Up until this year, Chen Xiangbei belonged to the kind who operated quietly, absolutely impossible to have had any professional experience.

"This being a rookie, his talent would be somewhat terrifying."

That said, the Renault race engineer pointed to the computer screen, which displayed the lap times Chen Xiangbei just completed.

1 minute 27.552 seconds.

The pole position record of this era at Catalonia Circuit was set by the King of Cars Schumacher in '04 with a lap time of 1 minute 15.022 seconds.

It appears that Chen Xiangbei was more than ten seconds behind, an exaggerated gap.

In fact, the Catalonia track record is only 1 minute 17.450 seconds, also set by the King of Cars Schumacher in '04.

So, in this calculation, Chen Xiangbei was only 10 seconds away from the track record.

Adding to the fact that Chen Xiangbei didn't have sufficient tire warming, and it was his first rookie test, plus the car had not been adjusted with feedback and all such unfavorable factors.

Then his lap time could indeed be described with the word "terrifying."

If still unable to understand, there were two other rookies on-site also running their first track tests.

Gary Paffett with the McLaren Team, driving the same championship car as Hamilton, did a lap time of 1 minute 27.841 seconds in the first lap yesterday, about 0.3 seconds slower than Chen Xiangbei.

Regarding Dong Hebin driving the Renault car, it was even more exaggerated; his first-lap speed was 1 minute 32.388 seconds, a full five seconds slower, completely not in the same league.

Even though Paffett's difference with Chen Xiangbei is not big, in fact, the Honda RA108 car's points standing last year was third from the bottom, with only 14 points for the whole year.

While the second to last Indian Force and last Super Aguri both had zero points all year!

Although McLaren's Silver Arrow car in '08 wasn't some dominating "Mars Rover," it was still head and shoulders above the Honda tractor.

The Honda Group chose to withdraw from the F1 event because, despite heavy investments over the years, they ended up with the embarrassing result of third from the bottom, truly a "heartbreaking" decision; this RA108 can be called the "culprit"!

Not just in the Renault Team's garage, as this was a continuation of last year's winter testing, all test data was open and shared, McLaren team members could also see Chen Xiangbei's lap times.

They were now somewhat suspecting whether there was an issue with the timing.

How could a Chinese rookie drive the Honda tractor RA108 and, in fact, outdo the McLaren champion car Silver Arrow?

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