𝘴𝘩𝘶𝘵 𝘶𝘱 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘥𝘳𝘪𝘷𝘦 || 𝘭𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘰𝘴𝘤𝘢𝘳

karma's antics

dedicated to @ElevenAviation_ 

highkey wrote this in 45 min and time lapsed it lmao

~

Oscar knew from the second that the five lights went out that this race was going to be one of the ugliest of the year, and therefore with that, his Formula One career.

But he had enough races behind him to know how to handle it. Today, Verstappen wouldn't throw anything at them that they couldn't handle. Today, nothing was going to stop Lando from winning because it was 2v1, and Oscar knew Carlos also wanted Lando to win the championship.

He had never gotten on particularly well with Carlos, but he knew Lando did and he didn't have a problem with it. They were sort of connected by their shared care for his teammate, who also happened to be Carlos' ex-teammate.

Either way, even though Carlos didn't know about their strategy, he wouldn't try to stop Lando from winning. Not a threat. The only threat had started next to him on the second row.

Had started, because as Oscar had predicted, the acceleration of his car had put him ahead of Sainz and into second. Carlos had also built a small gap to Verstappen, and Oscar knew that he and Lando could try to pull away.

The McLaren wasn't at its fastest on this circuit, but neither was the RedBull or the Ferrari. It was a pretty much even playing ground, and this was Lando's to win, not Oscar's or Carlos'.

Lando grinned to himself when he looked in his rearview mirrors at the end of the first lap and saw a papaya car in second. Oscar had done exactly what he said he would try to do, and that placed a tiny bit more reassurance in Lando's mind that this was both possible and what was going to happen.

The first and only round of pitstops ran smoothly for most of the frontrunners. Lando boxed first to keep him in the lead, Oscar the following lap, and he came out right behind Lando, exactly where he wanted to be.

The one person with a slow pitstop was Sainz.

And while that wasn't catastrophic, it wasn't ideal. Because now, it wasn't a Ferrari running behind Oscar, it was Max.

There were a few cars ahead of them that were yet to box but once they did, it would be Lando P1, Oscar P2, Max P3.

And everyone in front did ultimately box, placing the cars in exactly those positions.

10 laps remaining.

Max was still clearly in Oscar's rearview mirrors, but the gap of about three seconds wasn't closing. Oscar knew his weakness was tires, and that he would have to make sure he was managing properly.

9 laps remaining.

He saw Lando begin to push, and his breath caught. Building a gap would help him unless his tires also decided to give out on him, in which things got risky. But Lando had always been good at knowing when to push, and Oscar knew not to question anything over the radio.

8 laps remaining.

One lapse in the lap and Max had closed the gap by more than half a second. Oscar couldn't afford to let that happen again, not for his sake but also to protect Lando.

7 laps remaining.

Oscar would do whatever it took to stay in front of Max because he knew that he wouldn't be afraid to play as disrespectfully as it took to win this race and this championship. To steal it from Lando with his unsportsmanlike "tactics."

6 laps remaining.

If Oscar was to stay just out of reach for Verstappen, Lando would be unstoppable.