Formula 1: The GOAT

“You are doing well now. For the next two laps, keep driving by combining everything we practiced,” Fatih shouted to Seraphina. Even though their karts were almost touching, the roar of the engines on the track made a normal voice impossible to hear.

He had spent more than ten minutes correcting Seraphina’s major mistakes. True to his teaching style, he first let her drive the corners in a way she felt was optimal, and only then did he step in to correct her, demonstrating the best way. Although he would have liked to hear her reasoning for her lines, it wasn’t feasible on track, so he focused on making the corrections and watching her implement them.

He made sure to tailor the corrections to Seraphina’s driving style, avoiding the temptation to force his own aggressive yet smooth, contradictory style on her, a feat only possible thanks to his Invictus, now at Limit Break, which allowed him to be super aggressive while keeping the kart right on the edge. If he showed that to Seraphina and expected her to mimic it on the fly, it would be nigh impossible for her, who only had a little more than a year of karting experience.

Seraphina gave him a thumbs-up and started her push lap, trying to execute everything Fatih had just shown her. Before long, she entered the start-finish straight, leaning forward to reduce drag, with Fatih chasing her closely. He was using this as a chance to monitor her driving and to measure how much he could push his own kart in the dirty air behind another, testing his ability to control the resulting instability in the corners.

He calmly chased her, multitasking. Surprisingly, he realized he could push even harder amidst the instability. By making micro-corrections to counter the dirty air, he kept the kart smooth. A smile spread under his helmet; he relished the freedom and the immense control he felt. And then, as if to mess with him:

[ZONE HAS BEEN TRIGGERED]

“The most useless trigger of all time,” Fatih said in amusement as he glanced at all his abilities, which were now upgraded by a single grade.

His focus was on Invictus to see if it could be upgraded further. He received his answer…

[Invictus (Limit Break)] → [Invictus (Limit Break)]

When he saw no change, he immediately came up with two hypotheses: either Limit Break was the final level, or he had yet to meet the requirements for it to safely upgrade. He immediately tucked the thought to the back of his head and resumed following Seraphina, not planning to push harder despite the Zone upgrades, as there was no need.

……

“How did it feel? Any difficulties in some parts?” Fatih asked Seraphina in the pit lane once the first session was over. He helped her push her kart back to their section, while his own was collected by the Vortex mechanics.

Since she didn’t have a dedicated team like his, relying instead on her father and one of his mechanic buddies, Fatih stepped in as her setup engineer. He planned to make changes based on her feedback, teaching her to connect her feelings to the kart’s setup.

“At high speed, the kart feels unstable, and the rotation in the hairpins feels lazy. The front bite doesn’t feel the same as when we practice at home. Is it because of the different track?” Seraphina said, struggling to translate her feelings into technical terms.

But for Fatih, her description was more than enough. He could already pinpoint the issues. “I’ll incorporate those changes, don’t worry,” he said as they arrived at her garage.

Her father, who was following in silence, tilted his head, wondering what Fatih had understood from her limited explanation. He had been trying to learn about these things to help her, but this level of competition was beyond his understanding and was already burning a hole in their pockets. Still, he wasn’t planning on stopping prematurely; the benefits already outweighed the costs.

Upon reaching their designated tent, Fatih immediately got to work with her father’s mechanic friend. He put the training Apollo had given him into practice. After months of mentally tearing down and rebuilding an F4 engine, making setup changes on a kart felt remarkably simple.

While making the changes, Fatih made sure to explain to Seraphina why specific changes were being made as a result of her feedback, so she could understand what part did what and, in turn, break down her feelings in better detail in the future. It wasn’t going to happen overnight, but it was a starting point.

This hands-on teaching tied into a larger idea Fatih had been considering for a while, something he could now fund with his allotted “free use” money. It was only a few million at the moment, but that was enough to support several drivers’ karting careers. He was thinking of implementing it in cooperation with Tony Kart, which was one of the reasons they had been in touch and reached out to him for this substitute drive in the first place.

It took them forty minutes to finish everything that needed to be changed and adjusted. This left them with some additional time for Fatih to start a debriefing session with her and also have a discussion about the upcoming free practice and qualifying sessions planned for the day.

With so much to focus on, Seraphina found herself forgetting the nervousness she had felt at the start of Friday. When she first arrived, the size of the crowd had been so intimidating that she had kept her helmet on just to walk through the paddock. But now, fully focused on the technical details, those anxieties disappeared into the back of her mind. Without realizing it, she had even walked with Fatih while pushing the kart back to the garage without her helmet.

Their conversation continued until it was a few minutes before their next session was to start. Only then did Fatih head back to the Tony Kart tent to check and see if there was any information he needed to be updated on.

As for his own setup, Fatih didn’t feel the need to make any changes. He was confident he could win even with the kart’s current configuration, and since he could spend the time teaching her, it was the best opportunity for him to do so. Although his competitive feeling remained, the confidence that he could still win allowed him to spend that time coaching Seraphina.

And he was looking forward to the Qualifying and the race.