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“You gotta be kidding me,” he squints.
“You know this place, full of swinging dicks.”
For one of the most technologically advanced industries in the world, F1 has a long way to go to catch up with the rest of the world. We’ve never had a woman driver, an openly gay driver, barely any people of color.
“Whole lotta rich white boys,” Liam reads my mind and nods as we reach the garage and head inside to start the race.
Of course, I’m now one of those rich white boys, so I’m a bit of a hypocrite, but it pisses me off that Emily has to put up with this antiquated nonsense. Despite her degrees and mind, she still has to prove to people that she knows what she’s doing.
As soon as we’re in the garage bay, I see her doing just that. She’s showing James and Silas something on her laptop. She’s been working her ass off trying to improve tire performance and calling her old professor at Cambridge every day for updates on Tire-Gate.
“What’s going on?” I ask when I reach the three of them.
“Emily wants to change your Energy Recovery System settings,” Silas answers me.
“It’s a bad idea,” James adds. “You’ll lose time.”
“The time lost will be marginal in these conditions. We’ll save the tire life, and he’ll be more confident going into the corners,” Emily argues.
“And I’ve changed the camber and toe angles to increase tract
ion. Like I told you,” James taps her laptop screen.
“And I’m telling you, these tires are not going to hold together if you do that and do not turn down the ERS.”
“How long is the rain going to last?” I ask. Maybe we can get off the wet tires altogether soon enough.
“It’s going to get worse as it goes on,” Silas says, negating my previous thought.
“So we need to be concerned about wear life on these tires. Change the ERS,” I tell James.
“No, we can’t lose more time. We need the points. We aren’t changing Dante’s car, and we’re not changing yours,” Silas issues the final word and walks away.
James does the same. Emily snaps her laptop closed, letting out a huff and gazing up to the ceiling.
This is the problem, James doesn’t understand how I need the car set up, how I need the car to feel.
Emily does. We’ve worked in the simulator a dozen times now. She gets it.
And I trust her.
“Cole, time to go,” Liam yells across the garage bay.
“If you don’t feel like the car is with you, or if it’s oversteering, unlock your on-throttle differential. It’ll help and extend the tires a bit since you’ll come out of the corners a little more slowly,” she grimaces at me.
Pulling on my balaclava and hearing the raindrops hit the pavement just outside the team garage, I do my best to distract her. She’s nervous about the conditions as it is, and now my car isn’t set up how she wants it.
“Will do. Now give me my kiss,” I grin, pulling down the chin of my face mask. Emily gives me a PG-13 kiss since half the crew is watching and waiting for me.
“Good luck, have fun, go fast, come back to me, then take me to bed…and the other thing I’m not allowed to tell you because you’re stubborn.”
“Pretty soon, you’ll need to write that all down to remember it,” I smile as I pull my helmet on.
Every race, she extends her good luck wish by one new phrase. I’m starting to think she’s as superstitious as us drivers are, but knowing Emily, she’d never bank on something so scientifically refuted.
“Nope, it’s all up here,” she taps her temple then puts her thumb to her lip to chew her cuticle, nervously.
Right, more distracting needed.
