His team was a small one, and they had come to the endurance race track for a dream, but after five years, they hadn't advanced once.
There were many other teams that had gone through similar experiences.
After the wreckage on the track was cleared, the first lap of the race was over, and it was time for the second lap.
At the end of the first lap, the lap times were refreshed, and the rider from the Kawasaki team, on a Kawasaki H2, set the fastest lap time of the entire race.
The technicians in the major pit garages also didn't expect the Kawasaki team to be so fierce from the start, leading the pack. However, this was within reason.
Kawasaki's focus had always been on production bike racing, so whenever a race involved production bikes, the Kawasaki team was always very strong.
Of course, the other teams were not weak either, and they followed closely behind.
Eleven riders were eliminated in the first lap, mostly due to collisions and crashes, with a crash rate of ten percent.
However, Lin Yan estimated that this situation would last for at least three laps, because after three laps, the riders would have enough time to pull away from each other. At this point, they had only opened up a small gap.
As the race continued, Lin Yan's thoughts were confirmed. In the remaining two laps, there were continuous accidents, but not many. Coupled with the first lap, only nineteen people were eliminated in total.
Lin Yan searched the track for a lap before finding the red figure. Little Li was now in thirty-ninth place, moving up ten positions in three laps, which was very good.
Watching the race from the stands was indeed very enjoyable. The view was expansive, and there was a canopy above to block the sun and prevent rain. The only downside was that the surrounding spectators were a bit too noisy.
As the fourth lap began, the distance between the riders had increased slightly, and they were no longer as crowded as at the start. Few people were crashing due to collisions.
However, at the end of the fourth lap, Little Li, the rider from the DuK team, set the fastest lap time of the entire race, causing Lin Yan's fans to get a little excited, as it was the team of their idol.
Zhang Mingzhi in the DuK pit garage also felt quite gratified seeing this.
This was the strength of the factory team riders. The fastest lap times in these laps were being rotated among several factory team riders.
With continuous overtakes, Little Li's position had moved up to thirty-fourth, and it was estimated that he would enter the top thirty soon.
The qualifying race was expected to last about two hours, and according to Lin Yan's prediction, it would be around eighty laps. The main challenge would be in the later stages.
Su Mojin, who was beside him, was watching the race intently. Lin Yan would explain anything she didn't understand to her step by step.
On the track of Jianghai International Circuit, eighty 1000cc superbikes were speeding along, forming a long, living dragon.
The leader was now a Suzuki rider, and the Kawasaki H2 had already been pushed to second place.
While Kawasaki was strong in straight-line speed, Suzuki was equally strong in cornering.
At every corner, the two were exchanging positions. When the riders' skills were similar, it would not be easy to determine a winner in a short period.
The qualifying race tested both skill and luck, which was why so many small teams took the gamble.
Drawing a front-row starting position increased the possibility of advancing to the main race by one point.
By the eighth lap, Little Li had moved up to twenty-ninth place, and advancing to the main race should have no suspense.
After watching eight laps of the race, Lin Yan didn't find any particularly strong riders, so he stopped watching and lowered his head to rub Su Mojin's hands.
The truly skilled riders would appear in the main race tomorrow. It was strange, but as the race progressed, the weather actually improved, and the sun even appeared through the haze.
The sunlight broke through the dark clouds and shone on the ground, adding a touch of warmth to the track.
After another two laps, the race reached the tenth lap, and Little Li moved up to twenty-eighth place.
It was now very obvious that his riding style had begun to shift towards conservatism. The ranking in the qualifying race was not important; it only determined whether one could advance. Therefore, Little Li was now focusing on a steady approach.
"Who do you think will win between the two cars at the front?"
Su Mojin withdrew her hand and turned to look at Lin Yan, saying that Lin Yan's squeezing had made her hand hurt.
Hearing Su Mojin's words, Lin Yan shook his head. He couldn't answer this question either.
With his eyesight, he dared not assert who between Suzuki and Kawasaki would win the qualifying race. Moreover, several factory team riders were already in the top thirty.
They were not far from the two leading riders, and it was possible that they might catch up later. Besides, the race track was constantly changing, and no one could be sure.
Before Lin Yan could explain to Su Mojin, an accident suddenly occurred on the track.
"Oh my god, look at turn three! Two racing cars have gone off the track at the same time!"
Hao Dong in the live broadcast shouted, his eyes fixed on the situation on the track.
Just now, while overtaking a rider from a small team ahead, the rider from the BMW team, who was in nineteenth place, collided with him in a corner and both went off the track, plunging into the sand trap of the runoff area.
The spectators on the scene also gasped in surprise, but fortunately, the BMW rider managed to stabilize his car in time and did not crash.
"A false alarm. Fortunately, there was no major accident. Look, the BMW rider has stabilized his car and driven it out of the runoff area again."
The BMW rider immediately applied the brakes and downshifted the moment the car entered the runoff area, reacting very quickly. He quickly extended both legs to the sides to maintain the car's balance as much as possible.
The series of maneuvers were very professional. After shaking a few times in the sand, the car quickly stabilized.
However, the rider from the small team did not have such superb skills.
After the car entered the runoff area, it directly launched him out, and he fell heavily onto the sand in the runoff area. Although it didn't hurt, he was disqualified from the race.
Lin Yan was not startled by the scene on the track, but by the surrounding spectators.
However, he didn't see clearly how the other person crashed, and Su Mojin hadn't seen it either. They were just fooling around at the time.
"Brothers, let's follow the director's replay to see the specific situation just now."
The big screen in front of the stands switched to the overtaking footage from before.
The corner where the collision occurred was turn three. The two cars appeared on the small straight before turn three in the footage.
"We can see that at the end of the straight before turn three, the two cars were very close, almost the BMW rider..."
Although Hao Dong had seen the entire event, it was definitely not as accurate as the slow-motion replay on the big screen.