Sunday 28 September 2014

Japan 2014 (Round 15) - F1 Prediction League

Suzuka, Japan. One of the best tracks on the calendar - it's always a joy to watch cars attack here, around the S's, the Degners and the Spoon curbs.

For updates on the team hiring situation see the previous post (results from Singapore).

The battle for the championship will be intense here - Rosberg needs to stop Hamilton's momentum (just like at Monaco) but Suzuka has never been his best track. In 2013, he qualified 6th compared to Hamilton's 3rd and in 2012, he qualified 14th compared to Schumacher's 12th. Arguably he needs to be on pole to put doubts in Hamilton's mind but that's going to be very difficult to do.

There are many other thoughts - who will be second best...Red Bull? Williams? Ferrari? Any could feature around the technically demanding Suzuka.

The current championship standings are:




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Random


Thanks to everyone who has helped so far on random this year - please feel free to post suggestions here for other races. Nat helped with the random this time.

Category 1: Team matchups
In qualifying, which team in the following pairings will have the highest classified car (before any penalties)? 2 points for each correct answer
Red Bull vs Williams
Ferrari vs McLaren
Toro Rosso vs Force India
Lotus vs Sauber
Caterham v Marussia

Category 2: Teammate matchup accumulator
Pick a selection of drivers to beat their teammate in the race (points in brackets for each driver). This is an accumulator, so you need all your picks to win for the accumulator to come off. If any of your drivers does not beat their teammate, you score 0 points. In the event of a retirement, then if your driver was ahead (incorporating strategy) at the time of retirement then you score half the points for that driver.
Rosberg (2) vs Hamilton (2)
Ricciardo (1) vs Vettel (3)
Bottas (2) vs Massa (2)
Button (1) vs Magnussen (3)
Alonso (1) vs Kimi (3)
Vergne (2) vs Kvyat (2)
Hulkenberg (2) vs Perez (2)
Sutil (1) vs Gutierrez (3)
Grosjean (2) vs Maldonado (2)
Bianchi (1) vs Chilton (3)
Kobayashi (1) vs Ericsson (3)


Category 3: Points finishes
Pick one team to have both drivers finish in the top 10 - the following points will be scored for the team picks:
1 - Mercedes, Red Bull
2 - Ferrari, Williams
3 - McLaren
4 - Force India, Toro Rosso
5 - Other (Sauber, Lotus, Marussia, Caterham)

Question 4: Yes or No!
Answer yes or no for each of the following questions and receive 2 points for each correct answer.
a) Will Mercedes GP top every session (FP1, FP2, FP3, Q1, Q2, Q3, R)?
b) Will anyone find themselves in the gravel in the slipper Degner curves in either qualifying or the race



Tie-break

Which Samurai (Alonso or Kobayashi) will beat their teammate by the largest margin in qualifying and by how much?

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Template


Hamilton, Rosberg and Mercedes banned.

Feel free to post picks in the following format:

Qualifying: 
Race: 
Constructors:
Random:

Category 1 - Choice 1, Choice 2, ...
Category 2 - Choice 1, Choice 2, ...
Category 3 - Constructor
Category 4 - Y/N, Y/N

Tie-break: Alonso/Kobayashi, time: X.XXX seconds

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Sukuza should be spectacular - I have a feeling there are plenty more twists left this season.

As always picks are due before Free Practice 1 which is 0200 GMT/1000 JST.

16 comments:

  1. Gut brought me this far...

    Qualifying: Massa
    Race: Vettel
    Constructors: Red Bull
    Random:
    Category 1 - Mercedes, Williams, Toro Rosso, Sauber, Caterham
    Category 2 - Vettel, Magnussen, Gutierrez, Vergne, Hulkenberg
    Category 3 - Toro Rosso
    Category 4 - N, Y

    Tie-break: Alonso, time: 0.456 seconds

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Category 1 needs amending - I'll let you change Williams vs. Red Bull and Ferrari vs. McLaren before FP1 but the rest is confirmed. Cheers.

      Delete
  2. Qualifying: RIC
    Race: RIC
    Constructors: Red Bull
    Random:
    Category 1 - Red Bull, Ferrari, STR, Lotus, Marussia
    Category 2 - RIC, SUT, BUT, GRO, HAM
    Category 3 - Constructor
    Category 4 - NO, NO

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Brian! Thanks for posting - you haven't posted a constructor for Category 3 or a tie-break. Feel free to add those before FP1.

      Delete
  3. Qualifying: Ricciardo
    Race: Alonso
    Constructors: Ferrari
    Random:
    Category 1 - Williams, Ferrari, Force India, Sauber, Marussia
    Category 2 - Alonso, Ricciardo, Hulkenberg, Kvyat
    Category 3 - Force India
    Category 4 - Y, N

    Tie-break: Kobayashi, time: 0.223 seconds

    ReplyDelete
  4. Great R category, loads to consider. Need to start climbing the table again as I haven't scored points since...Germany?

    Qualifying: Massa
    Race: Ricciardo
    Constructors: Red Bull
    Random:
    Category 1 - Williams, Ferrari, Force India, Sauber, Marussia
    Category 2 - Alonso, Button
    Category 3 - Ferrari
    Category 4 - N, N

    Tie-break: Kobayashi, time: 1.457 seconds

    ReplyDelete
  5. Qualifying - Ricciardo
    Race - Ricciardo
    Constructors - Red Bull
    Random -
    Category 1: Red Bull, Ferrari, Torro Rosso, Sauber, Marussia
    Category 2: Magnussen, Hulkenberg, Bianchi
    Category 3: Ferrari
    Category 4: Y, Y
    Tie-Break: Alonso, 0.3s

    ReplyDelete
  6. Qualifying: BOT
    Race: BOT
    Constructors:WIL
    Random:
    Category 1 - WIL FER FI SAU CAT
    Category 2 - BOT ALO KVY
    Category 3 - FI
    Category 4 - N, Y
    Tie-break Kobayashi, time 0.900

    ReplyDelete
  7. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Qualifying: Ricciardo
    Race: Alonso
    Constructors: RedBull
    Random:
    Category 1 - RedBull, Ferrari, ToroRosso, Lotus, Caterham
    Category 2 - Maldonado, Perez, Massa, Vettel
    Category 3 - Force India
    Category 4 - N, N

    Tie-break: Kobayashi, time: 1,100 seconds

    ReplyDelete
  9. Qualifying: Bottas
    Race: Bottas
    Constructors: Williams
    Random:
    Category 1 - Williams, McLaren, Force India, Sauber, Caterham
    Category 2 - Bottas, Raikkonen
    Category 3 - Force India
    Category 4 - Y, Y
    Tie-break: Kobayashi, time 0.891 seconds

    ReplyDelete
  10. Aled Lewis' picks:

    Qualifying: Ricciardo
    Race: Ricciardo
    Constructors: Red Bull
    Random:
    Category 1 - Red Bull, McLaren, Force India, Sauber, Caterham
    Category 2 - Ricciardo, Alonso
    Category 3 - Red Bull
    Category 4 - Yes, No

    Tie-break: Alonso, time: 0.121s

    ReplyDelete
  11. Such a tough one to call with the small matter of a typhoon hanging over proceedings. Will the race be moved? Will the safety car be out for the majority of it? Will we even get a race? And who drives best in typhoon conditions. I’m fairly sure it isn’t Max Chilton, but I’ve been wrong before.

    Qualifying: Bottas
    Race: Dan the man
    Constructors: Red Bull
    Random:
    Category 1 – Williams, Ferrari, Toro Rosso, Sauber, Marussia
    Category 2 – Alonso, Bianchi, Kobayaaaaashi
    Category 3 - Ferrari
    Category 4 - N, Y

    Tie-break: Kobayashi, time: 0.87 seconds

    ReplyDelete
  12. Qualifying: Vettel
    Race: Vettel
    Constructors: Red Bull
    Random:
    Category 1 - Red Bull, Ferrari, Toro Rosso, Lotus, Marussia
    Category 2 - Vettel, Bottas, Alonso, Bianchi
    Category 3 - McLaren
    Category 4 - N, Y

    Tie-break: Alonso, time: 0.472 seconds

    ReplyDelete
  13. Tough weekend I think qualifying was the toughest

    Qualifying: Sebastian Vettel
    Race: Daniel Ricciardo
    Constructors: Red Bull
    Random:
    Category 1 – Red Bull, Ferrari, Force India ,Lotus and Marussia
    Category 2 –Fernando Alonso, Kamui Kobayashi, Jules Bianchi and Jenson Button
    Category 3 - Williams
    Category 4 - N, Ys

    Tie-break: Kamui Kobayashi time: 0.735 seconds

    ReplyDelete
  14. Qualifying: Valtteri Bottas
    Race: Dan Ricciardo (really tempted by Vettel because of the weather but Dan is realistically marginal favourite even in probable wet conditions)
    Constructors: Red Bull
    Random:
    Category 1 - Williams, Ferrari, Toro Rosso, Sauber, Marussia
    Category 2 - Bottas, Hamilton
    Category 3 - Ferrari
    Category 4 - N, Y
    Tie-break: Kobayashi, time 0.676 seconds

    ReplyDelete