Formula 1: The GOAT

”Hell no,” Fatih said during the formation lap when he saw the system offering him another mission to race against Apollo on equal machinery, with the same reward and penalty still on the table: a free upgrade of any ability to Limit Break if he won and a 7,500-point penalty if he lost.

”HAHAHAHAHA, I didn’t take you for a coward,” Apollo was heard laughing when he heard Fatih’s rejection of the mission without even thinking about it.

”Doing the same thing again and again and expecting different results is insanity,” Fatih said, using it as an excuse instead of directly acknowledging that he knew he was yet to reach a level of experience where he could go ahead and challenge Apollo on equal machinery and equal abilities.

”There is always an excuse to not do something,” Apollo said with a satisfied expression on his face because he saw with his own eyes that, despite his competitive nature, he was not dumb enough to take the same gamble again and again.

”I will challenge you one day and beat you, but not today,” Fatih said as he came out of the final corner, entering the start-finish straight, doing a burnout to remove the dirt accumulated on the rear tires.

”What about this?” Apollo said as a new system mission appeared in front of him.

Fatih read it carefully before doing some mental calculations and pressed Yes without thinking much about it, knowing that it was not something he should ever refuse.

[Situational Mission.

Time attack: Finish the race in 87 minutes.

Rewards: Doubling the chance of Zone activating.

Penalty: Halving the chances of Zone activating.]

The mission was a win-win for Fatih. If Zone activated, then he won, and if it didn’t activate for the entire season, it wouldn’t really have a negative effect on him since he was still fast enough to not rely on luck for his performance on the track.

After a final burnout, he finally came to a stop in his P1 position, aggressively positioning himself angled towards the P2 position because, lo and behold, Apollo was already there waiting for him.

”I can’t let you have everything easy, so I should be a challenge,” Apollo said, as if he had proximity chat while in his car, because despite Fatih not accepting the mission, he had still joined the track to race against him.

”Who am I to deny it?” Fatih said with a smile. Since he was getting a free opportunity to race Apollo, he was not going to deny it when such opportunities were rare. He then focused back on the lights after looking at the rear-view mirrors.

Beep... Beep... Beep... Beep... Beep...

.....

”THE LIGHTS ARE OFF, AND WE ARE GOING FOR THE 300KM! FATIH HAS A GOOD REACTION AND MOVES TO COVER THE NON-EXISTENT P2 DRIVER AS HE DRAGS THE CAR TOWARDS TURN ONE...”

The commentator commented excitedly while the feed, remaining sourced from his helmet cam, gave everyone watching a full experience of what happens in a race start all the way through the lap.

....

”He really is simulating an opponent in his mind,” Helmut could be heard saying, as if the feed had given him the final hint of what he had previously only been informed of but still couldn’t fully believe.

The helmet cam showed him immediately glancing at the rear-view mirror as he moved to cover the P2 position, as if he were in an actual race with an opponent.

Upon that realization, Helmut started watching the drive with that in mind, and Fatih’s actions kept proving him right again and again, showing a driver fighting a phantom enemy of such high quality that even he felt like he could see the opponent, and that opponent looked mighty.

But despite that, Fatih was still delivering scarily close lap times one after another as he did multiple things at once. He was fighting a mighty phantom enemy and keeping him behind, yet kept the tires within their perfect window without slowing down, keeping his lap times very close, varying by only a few tenths up or down while surprisingly doing so by taking different racing lines, making him slower than previous laps in some places and faster in others but ending up with very similar lap times in the end.

”A monstrous talent on top of a right decision.”

........

It took fifteen laps before the commentators finally caught on, or rather, Murat, the rally driver, was the one who noticed it and brought it to attention before the TV director started providing the live mini-sector data of different laps. It showed he was not fast in the same places after every lap, with the different patterns now extending for the first ten laps, meaning that, other than the straights and some corners, he took the remaining ones differently each lap but still ended up with the same lap time.

Lap 12: 1:31.344

Lap 13: 1:30.943

Lap 14: 1:31.106

Lap 15: 1:31.073

Lap 16: 1:31.407

Lap 17: 1:31.368

Lap 18: 1:31.509

Lap 19: 1:30.984

Lap 20: 1:31.202

Lap 21: 1:30.946

”He is keeping the pace within half a second of his fastest lap to the slowest one. OH MY GOD,” Murat said as the TV director used the left side of the screen, where it usually had the timing tower, to put the lap times Fatih had driven from lap 12 to lap 21.

”Is there a reason to react this way because of that?” Mehmet, the commentator, asked for the sake of the viewers.

”That is a scary level of consistency, considering the constantly changing conditions like tire temperature, the fuel being used making the car lighter, the tires losing grip, along with mental fatigue. All of those combined should have resulted in some of the laps requiring him to be very slow, by a few seconds, but it seems like he is miraculously managing them while also keeping everything within that half-second band. If this had been a race, this would have been a monstrous and super-competitive stint.”

Murat went further and further, talking about those details as Fatih proved him right again and again, dragging those harder-compounded testing tires for the entirety of the 57-lap stint while still maintaining that lap range.

”HE ANNOUNCED HIMSELF TO THE WORLD WITH A MIGHTY AND CONSISTENT DRIVE AS HE CROSSES THE FINISH LINE TO COMPLETE HIS 300KM TEST, AND HE DID IT WITHIN 86 AND A HALF MINUTES! A MONSTER ANNOUNCES HIS ARRIVAL TO THE GRID AS HE CARRIES THE RED AND CRESCENT FLAG WITH HIM! IT IS FATIH YILDIRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIM!”