Outside, the world was loud and restless.
Even though the F1 season had already ended, the noise never truly stopped. Rumors, announcements, speculation, analysis. Summarizing 2017, predicting 2018. The entire motorsport world kept spinning at a dizzying pace, one undercurrent colliding with the next.
Against that chaos, Maranello felt like an anomaly.
Far from the spotlight and tucked away in its own corner of the world, it was almost isolated, like a sanctuary cut off from the noise. Focus was easier here. Distractions faded into the distance.
If anyone believed that the winter break meant drivers lounging on yachts and basking in the sun, joking their days away, they could not have been more wrong.
Kai had no idea how Hamilton or Verstappen spent their off-season, but for him, the coming months were busier than anything he had ever experienced.
Busy to the point where his feet barely touched the ground.
Quite literally.
The FIA placed strict limits on winter testing. The purpose was simple. Prevent wealthy teams from endlessly refining their cars and gaining unfair advantages.
Under the regulations, drivers were prohibited from driving the upcoming season's cars during the winter break. If they wanted on-track testing, they could only use cars from two seasons prior. That meant if Kai wanted to sit in an F1 cockpit, it had to be a 2016-spec car.
Even then, time was tightly controlled.
Across preparations for the 2018 season, teams were limited to twenty days of running the 2016 car. Each main driver could drive no more than four days, capped at one thousand kilometers.
There were exceptions.
Promotional events.
At most, two sessions. Each limited to one hundred kilometers. No race tires allowed. Only special demo compounds.
Official FIA preseason testing was scheduled for late February and early March. All ten teams would gather in Barcelona. Three days total. Each driver assigned one and a half days, twelve hours of running.
In other words, outside of official testing, real track time in a new car during the winter was painfully scarce.
Simulators carried the rest.
In theory, the winter break should have been relaxing.
In reality, that only applied to veterans.
For a rookie like Kai, it was closer to a nightmare.
Lack of experience. Lack of mileage. Not just with the 2018 car, but with F1 itself.
The one small mercy was that Kai had previously participated in Ferrari's 2018 car development as a test driver. He had logged simulator hours and conducted real testing at Fiorano. What had once seemed incidental now became a genuine advantage.
Even so, it was nowhere near enough.
If he wanted to be ready for F1, the winter could not be wasted. The workload had to increase. Not by a little, but by several levels.
After all, this was Formula One.
The pinnacle.
First came physical training.
Doubled. No. Tripled.
A GP3 race lasted barely thirty minutes, forty at most. An F1 race demanded ninety to one hundred and twenty minutes at far higher speeds and under far greater G-forces. Inside a scorching cockpit, drenched in sweat, dehydration was a constant risk.
This was not an amateur concern.
Even experienced drivers struggled at circuits like Spa or Singapore, where physical limits were pushed to the edge.
Cardio was the foundation. There was no compromise. If Kai wanted to survive race day, let alone perform, the basics had to be flawless.
Strength training followed.
So did agility work.
As Mekies had warned, Kai was still growing. F1 cars were extremely sensitive to weight and center of gravity. Muscle mass had to increase.
Not bulk.
Definition. Balance. Control.
Over the past year, Kai's training regimen had already earned him a reputation at the Ferrari Driver Academy. Everyone knew he trained like a machine.
Even so, there were days he collapsed completely.
One afternoon, strength coach Karl Brasko stood over Kai as he lay motionless in a pool of sweat, staring at the ceiling.
"Perfect session," Brasko said with satisfaction. "Tomorrow, we increase intensity by ten percent."
Kai could not even protest. He could not move a finger. He lay there for five full minutes, questioning the meaning of life, watching Brasko walk away.
And this was just routine.
Morning, afternoon, evening training sessions. Every spare hour filled.
Then came simulator work.
Without track time, this was everything.
On one side, circuit familiarization. Every corner. Every camber change.
On the other, full race simulations.
GP3 had no pit stops. F1 did. Starts. Pit entry. Safety cars. Restarts. Unpredictable scenarios. Everything was new.
If it were just driving laps, it would have been easy. Hours could disappear like a video game.
But simulators were not games.
Every session ended in debriefs. Data analysis. Technical meetings.
Telemetry. Feedback. Adjustments.
And beyond that, the deeper layers.
Rules. Sporting regulations. Technical directives.
Strategy.
Compared to GP3, the biggest difference in F1 was not speed or pit stops.
It was strategy.
One pit stop decision alone could branch into countless outcomes. Tire choices. Timing. Reacting to weather, crashes, safety cars. Making the right call in seconds.
This was not mechanics.
It was art.
GP3 strategy was crude. Push flat out and finish.
F1 was chess at three hundred kilometers per hour.
Cars degraded. Conditions shifted. Drivers adapted. Strategy evolved lap by lap.
This constant volatility was the real appeal of F1.
If racing were only about speed, it would be boring. Flat out on straights. Precision through corners.
What separated legends was judgment.
That was how Senna and Schumacher won championships in the second or third fastest cars. They extracted everything.
Physical training and simulators were exhausting.
But the real pressure came from strategy meetings.
How to position. How to gamble.
"If a safety car comes now and the hard tires have eight laps on them, do we pit?"
"What if it's softs?"
"Why are we losing time in medium-speed corners here?"
"If temperature drops suddenly, if rain hits, how does the tire window shift?"
These were battles unseen on television.
They were the core of racing.
Only now did Kai realize the truth.
He had only just stepped through the door of the formula racing world.
Street racing. GP3.
Those relied on instinct and talent. Trust yourself and go.
F1 was different.
Talent was only the ticket in. Everyone here was talented. Drivers. Engineers. Strategists.
No one reached the summit on talent alone.
After running forward for so long, Kai finally entered motorsport's sacred hall.
And he was still only at the entrance.
A vast unknown lay ahead.
…
"Ah…"
Kai yawned deeply, eyes barely open.
Song Bo had been interrupted three times already. He looked Kai up and down with exaggerated seriousness and nudged him with an elbow.
"Don't tell me you stayed up all night watching adult movies. Boss, impressive, but take care of your health."
Kai finished yawning, tears at the corners of his eyes, and laughed helplessly.
"I wish I had that kind of time. I'm completely overloaded."
Three months had vanished without notice.
Three days ago, Kai finished winter training and returned to Shanghai for final exams.
Ferrari knew Jiang Mo's stance. Marchionne and Arrivabene supported it. They approved his return for exams and even carved out extra days so he could spend time with his parents.
Song Bo could not understand it.
"You're already in F1. Winter break should be for rest. If you can't relax now, when can you? Summer break?"
Kai thought for a moment, then started counting on his fingers.
"Morning run. Physical training. Simulator. Strategy meeting. Mental training. Lunch."
"Then simulator. Strategy meeting. Physical training. Media training. Race footage review. Dinner. Physical training. End of day."
That was enough.
Song Bo felt his jaw disconnect.
"Wow. Like a hamster."
Kai laughed. "Accurate."
Song Bo blinked. "Mental training? Media training? Boss, why do you need those?"
Mental training was about handling pressure. Maintaining focus. Recovering from mistakes.
F1 was a sport of confidence. Decisions were made in hundredths of a second. Doubt was fatal.
When confidence was high, everything flowed. When it cracked, performance collapsed.
Like Vettel. Brilliant when in form. Error-prone when shaken.
F1 also allowed recovery. Mistakes did not always end races. Response mattered more than avoidance.
Media training was different.
Not just journalists. Sponsors. Exposure was part of the job. From drivers to team principals to CEOs.
Verstappen was a perfect example. Unmatched talent. Near-zero social skills. Sponsors preferred Ricciardo.
All of this existed beyond the spotlight.
A full day trained both body and mind until nothing remained.
Even Kai struggled.
And once he committed, he went all in.
"I know," Kai said lightly. "But everything is new. They want me fully prepared."
Song Bo nodded. "Jumping straight from GP3 to Ferrari. Even Verstappen went to Toro Rosso first. The whole paddock must be watching you."
He paused.
"So what were you doing last night?"
"Physics problems," Kai said.
Song Bo froze.
"I promised my mom. No abandoning school."
This time, it was not humility.
The workload was overwhelming. Even after training, Kai sought Monfardini out to study race footage.
Experience was his weakness.
There were no shortcuts.
Back home, he spent his time studying.
At least the exams covered old material.
Song Bo scoffed. "You're Kai Zhizhou. Exams are nothing."
"Eating water and drinking rice," Kai repeated, suddenly laughing uncontrollably.
Song Bo stared at him, defeated.
They chased each other across the field, laughing.
Then entered the classroom.
The room fell silent.
Every gaze locked onto Kai.
He smiled and pointed at the air. "Class monitor, careful. A fly."
Laughter followed.
Then a girl appeared at the door.
"Kai Zhizhou, can you come out for a moment?"
Whispers exploded.
Su Tong.
The Ice Goddess.
And the world, quietly, shifted.
~~----------------------
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