Chapter 5: Melbourne: Saturday
As the day began. Hunt's alarm clock blared over and over. Groggily Hunt sat up and started to make breakfast. Since making anything else but grilled cheese had the risk off burning something he decided to scratch cooking and buy breakfast at a nearby café. While he was getting dressed in his team shirt. he heard a knock on his door.
He looked through his peek hole to see his teammate George Russell on the other side.
"Come on! Mate! You're gonna be late!" George called.
"Coming" He called back as he stuffed his feet into his shoes and pulled his keys of the wall hook.
He opened his door greeted George.
"Good Morning" He started
As they walked out into the lobby of their hotel, a horde of Hunt fans crowded up and started spewing questions.
"What was it like driving for the first time?"
"What does it feel like in a F1 car?"
"Was it hard to drive?"
After a couple of questions. Hunt said "Hey guys? As much as I love answering your questions I have to go if I'm going to make it to FP3."
Right after the crowd started to break apart, George came over talking to Lando and someone who he didn't quite know. He looked Asian and around 6 feet tall. Considerably tall for a F1 driver. The average height is 180 cm but he looked roughly 185cm (fun fact I actually have no clue what the average height is, feel free to tell me). Then it clicked, this man was Alexander Albon.
"Hey William! Meet my friend: Alex Albon."
Both of them shook hands. Both Lando and George face palm.
Lando whispers to George "why are they so formal? This is a friendly workspace not a business meeting"
George chuckled and walked up to them. "Okay as good as you guys are together, Me, Hunt, and Lando need to get to FP3 if we still want our seats."
Alex told both of them good luck and left to go use the DTM simulator. (If you don't know, after Alex was dropped from Red Bull he announced he was going to drive in DTM).
(Later)
After a lot of explaining to their team members why they were late they finally managed to get into their cars and leave the garage. Both drivers were running with a new set up. The team had fitted both cars with the new wing, and sent them both out. Even though the team had told Hunt that this would be an improvement, he was still reluctant to use it.
Eventually Hunt agreed to use it and figure worst case scenario he'd spend a bit more time in the garage tweaking his wing.
As it turned out Hunt had not needed to come back into the garage and tweak his wing. Although it didn't offer to most time gained Hunt felt relaxed in the car as is had suited him perfectly. The car felt planted and he could be confident into every corner and have more confidence left over for the exit.
Feeling great he zoomed to a P12 lap. He slowed for a outlap to cool his tires and then come in for new ones.
*After the inlap and in the pitlane*
Engineer: Great job! P12! You wanna come in to rest?
Hunt: No I want to keep my momentum and get myself ready for the long race.
Engineer: Ok! If you get to tired your welcome to abandon the lap and come in!
Hunt: Ok.
As he finished his outlap he revved his engine and started his final lap of the day. He was pushing hard and maybe a little to hard as when he exited turn 4 he got greedy with the amount of curb taken. Hunt got a snap of oversteer he couldn't catch which spewed the car into the the wall with a demolished front wing and a detached tire hanging on by the wheel tethers.
George on the other hand had faired better and had knocked in a P14 lap time before Hunt had ruined any chance of him getting any faster time.
*In the middle of Russell's 2nd push lap*
Engineer: Red Flag! Red Flag!
GRussell: Are your serious?
Engineer: Yes. I am very serious. When am I not serious. (XD I had to do it)
After Hunt's stricken Jaguar had been moved off the circuit, Russell tried for a faster lap but failed. Whether Hunt could even take part in Quali was in question.
Later that day in qualifying, Hunts crew had somehow put the car put the car back together in time for qualifying meaning Hunt would not have to start from dead last on his debut race.
Russell left with 6 minutes on the clock and started a benchmark lap. Hunt left shortly after Russell and started benchmark lap. Both him and Russel set high 1:22's and pitted to get fresh tires for their final flyer.
On Hunt's flyer he gained 4 tenths of a second on his lap boosting him from P16 to P11. Russel gained 9 tenth of a second through the first and second sector but a large snap of oversteer lost him 3 tenths and he finished P12, yet as the faster cars finished their laps, the two Jaguars started falling down the order, as Q1 ended both Jaguars just about scraped through with Hunt and Russell finishing 14th and 15th respectively.
After Q1 the team was left confused to as why they were so far of the pace. They looked all over the car and found nothing. When they couldn't find anything they simply left it on the track not rubbering in yet.
Going into Q2 the team spent time working out setup changes to improve on what the driver felt comfy with. As the session time ticked down, the team sent Russell out with 4 minutes to spare and the sent Hunt out with 3 minutes to spare. They were taking a big risk, if neither driver did well on their lap it was day over.
To their shock Hunt finished P10 while Russell finished P9. There was still 3 cars on track, the Ferrari of Carlos Sainz, the McLaren of Lando Norris and the Sauber of Callum Ilott. As Norris crossed the line, he went up from P12 to P6, as Sainz rounded the final corner, time seemed to slow as Sainz crossed the line. Sainz jumped from P13 to P11! The Jaguar garage exploded into cheers as they had thought they made it though. Then as the turned back to the scoreboard they cheers fell silent. Callum Ilott had just barely made the P10 position and had knocked George Russell out of the top 10.
Engineer: P11. P11. Good Job. Good job.
GRussell: Disappointing, but I did everything I could. Sorry guys.
Engineer: P13. P13. Good Job, pick up rubber and bring it home.
Hunt: Ahhhh could have been better, but anyways good job guys, you did the most you could have done.
That concluded Jaguar F1's first ever qualifying.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Cyanwastaken
Cyanwastaken I'm so sorry with the lack of uploads but its just been hard for me to get started. I hope you enjoy this chapter and I will see you in the next one. Byeeeee!
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