Racing for her love (Madison Beer x Male reader fanfic)

Chapter 8 || Benchmark

Y/N POV:
Circuit Albert Park, Melbourne

It's time for free practice 1, for the first time the car would be run in race trim. We've spend countless hours on the sim back on Stuttgart, but now on race pace, this is it. A true benchmark for the car's performance compared to other cars.

I got in the car and one of my mechanics strapped me in.

I was strapped in tight and I checked my mirrors quickly.

Radiocheck Y/N? Said Jeff over the radio.

I pressed the radio button.

Copy copy, radiocheck. I responded.

All clear Y/N. Said Jeff.

Free practice was underway and the team started my engine. I prepared to drive out of the garage.

All personal clear, we have a car leaving the garage. Tire blankets off in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, now! Said Jeff over the radio.

The tire blankets were removed from my car and the front jack man carefully lowered the car to the floor.

I held my clutch pedals in, made sure the car was in 1st gear. My head mechanic walked backwards while holding his hand forward pointing to my car. He checked if there were any cars approaching through the fast lane and gave the sign I could drive out.

I let my right clutch pedal on my wheel go and turned my wheel all the way to the right. I drove out carefully to the end of the pitlane.

Y/N, let's do a quick practice start and then an installation lap. Said Jeff.

I pulled over to the right at the end of pitlane, changed my clutch mapping on my steering wheel, pulled my clutch pedals in again and waited for the other cars to pass by.

I then revved my engine up to about 10500RPM, held it there for 5 seconds, then let my right clutch pedal go. The clutch mapping was quite aggressive and I shot away cleanly.

If we get those starts on Sunday, we could win quite a lot of places. Said Jeff satisfied.

I started to go though all the 8 gears and warmed my tires a bit more.

And box this lap again Y/N, come in again then we'll look into the practice programs, we'll also do a pitstop practice so don't run em over. Said Jeff.

So at the end of the lap I came in the pitlane.

I broke just in time to slow down to 80kph for the pitlane. I pressed the pitlimiter button and looked for my team. I quickly spotted em and I turned in to the pit box and slowed down to the marker. It was perfect and the tire change went smooth.

Good job Y/N. Said Jeff.

I then got pushed back into the garage.

The rest of the practice went very clean, no major issues and we ended up P3 in the overall timings. Charles Leclerc topped the session with Max Verstappen close behind. The practice lap times don't say everything about the overall pace, but they could tell about the reliability and the tire wear of a car.