After confirming the condition of his tires, Qin Miao was confident he could hold off Verstappen for a few more laps.
Soon, lap 38, at the end of the second sector between T9 and T10 in the DRS zone, Verstappen launched a probing attack on Qin Miao.
It was called a DRS zone, but the length of this straight wasn't nearly enough for current F1 cars to fully unleash their potential and overtake.
The current F1 cars are too long and too wide. Unless the car in front takes a wide line out of T9, or there's a significant performance gap between the two cars, the rear car can only shorten the distance to the front car with the advantage gained in this DRS zone.
Verstappen knew this too, so he didn't make any substantial attack. He just deliberately nosed in on the inside line when entering the corner and made a not-so-late late braking.
