Canada 2014 Results and Championship Standings (7/19)

Thanks for everyone's patience. I've been away so haven't been able to give the prediction league the full attention it deserves - things will be back on track from now on. However I'll keep this one short so I can get the Austria thread up and running!

Suffice to say, well done to Daniel Ricciardo! He had some luck along the way but maximised his performance during the race. Vettel's not used to this situation but fair play that he genuinely seemed happy for his teammate.

In the prediction league it's really heating up at the top. We have another new leader (4 different championship leaders in as many races). The excellent Lotus constructors team of Sangan and Dragan continue to perform well.

Big congratulations to Keba who scored their first win so far. This is an excellent reward for impressive consistency (13 points scores out of 14 races). Dragan and Joe also finished on the podium, their ninth and fifth podiums respectively.

Canada 2014 (Round 7) - F1 Prediction League

Welcome to Canada - one of the strongholds of Lewis Hamilton. The Brit is odds on favourite to take the pole and the victory here so Rosberg must aim to spring a surprise as a victory in Canada will be a major blow to Hamilton's championship credentials.

There promises to be a lot of excitement throughout the field as well as a different looking grid. Canada is a very different circuit to Spain or Monaco so expect to see a different pecking order to either of these races.

Mercedes are obviously still banned for Constructors but any other team is an option. I would love to make this a longer post but I'm heading abroad for a week in a couple of hours, expect the results thread on Tuesday/Wednesday. After this everything will get back to normal!

As always here is a re-cap of the current standings:

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Random

Thanks to Michael, Nat and Joe for their help in creating this random.
  
This time the random involves a number of random questions:

How many cars will finish on the same lap as the race winner?
Correct – 3 points
1-3 away – 2 points
4-6 away – 1 point

Will both Force India drivers score points? Yes/No (2 points for correct answer)

Which driver will beat their teammate in the most sessions throughout the weekend?* (Raikkonen/Chilton/Maldonado/Ericsson) (3 points for best guess, 2 points for 2nd etc.)

Which driver will beat their teammate in the most sessions throughout the weekend?*
(Ricciardo/Bottas/Kvyat/Rosberg) (3 points for best guess, 2 points for 2nd etc.)

Will there be a safety car? Yes/No (2 points for correct answer)

Pole qualifying margin over/under 0.2 seconds? Over/Under (2 points for correct answer)

Winning margin over/under 7 seconds? Over/Under (2 points for correct answer)

The tie-break question is what will be the time difference between the fastest Mercedes driver and the fastest non-Mercedes driver in qualifying?

Good luck!

* Note: there are six opportunities to score points - practice 1, practice 2, practice 3, qualifying, race finish and fastest lap. Points will be scored for qualifying, race and fastest lap if a teammate DNS, DNF, DNQ or DSQ however this is not true for practice e.g. if the selected driver's teammate sets no laps then a point is not scored.

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Feel free to post picks in the following format:

Qualifying: 
Race: 
Constructors: [Not Mercedes as they are banned]
Random:
Cars on same lap as race winner - 0-21
FI drivers both in points - Yes/No
Teammate A - Raikkonen/Chilton/Maldonado/Ericsson
Teammate B - Ricciardo/Bottas/Kvyat/Rosberg
Safety Car - Yes/No
Pole Margin - Over/Under 0.2 seconds
Race Margin - Over/Under 7 seconds
Tie-break - X seconds

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Last year Vettel swept home to take an easy victory, at that point his third of the season. Alonso charged through the field to finish second while Hamilton had to settle for third - although 54 seconds up the road from his teammate. Unfortunately after this race Vettel also went on to capture 10 of the next 12 race victories.

A flashback to the prediction league last year shows a MetalGatherer win (they'd dearly like to repeat this to make it consecutive wins, both in 2014 and at the Canada venue). Kim and Wander were also on the podium last year.

Good luck all!

Monaco 2014 Results and Championship Standings (6/19)

First off, apologies for the delay in posting the results - I always aim to get the results out fairly quickly which I obviously didn't do this time.

All I can say is wow! Monaco qualifying was one of the most explosive issues we've seen in a long time. Many are convinced that Rosberg would never 'cheat' and that his error was genuine. Others have pointed out the odd steering inputs and the context of the situation as proof of Rosberg's guilt.

Regardless of how, it was important for Rosberg to break Hamilton's momentum here and he certainly did. Had he lost pole and almost certainly the race, he'd be running into the Canada, Austria, Britain leg with his teammate lining up to win eight in a row. Now Nico has seized back the championship lead and got inside his teammates head. 

The Monaco weekend always creates surprises - and this seemed to confuse most of the title contenders with the top three all not scoring points and having consecutive point streaks of 9 (current longest streak), 8 and 7 races ended.

Others throughout the field read the situation far better with MetalGatherer and Juan Medina excelling in particular. Well done to both especially as this is Juan Medina's third race. Congratulations. Another victory takes MetalGatherer's win count to 3 from 21 (third in the all-time list).

After De Montezemolo's insistence that Ferrari bring their season back on track, Joe took a podium for the Prancing Horse, capturing the fourth of his prediction league career. One thing is clear that Ferrari are still not happy with seventh in the Constructors Championship (see below).

The top four in the championship still remain exceedingly close although a new leader has emerged! Plus the top four is now a top five/six.


Championship Standings

Constructors Championship

Read on for more detail.

Monaco 2014 (Round 6) - F1 Prediction League

F1 continues the momentum of the European season and heads into its most famous race weekend of the year, Monaco!

I'm excited - the thought of these torque-heavy monsters speeding through the streets of Monaco will create plenty of action - anything could happen! It's a big unknown but we could see a lot of crashes and perhaps a certain Red Bull close on the tails of the all-dominant Mercedes.

The Mercedes extended their lead in both pace terms and points in Spain. This now means, and I'll re-iterate later, that Mercedes are banned as a Constructors pick. They exceeded the 100 points gap needed and have also won five races in a row. This is not necessarily a permanent thing depending on if others close but I'll keep you updated.

Similarly with Hamilton showing the level of dominance in terms of getting results, he's already 33 points ahead in the qualifying championship (so only needs 17 points before he gets banned) plus he's won four in a row (five wins needed to be banned). A lights to flag victory for Hamilton this weekend could mean he's banned from both qualifying and race. Rosberg is very likely to be banned from the race too if he has over a 50 point gap to third place in the Drivers Championship.

As always here is a re-cap of the current standings:

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Random

Thanks to Michael and Sangan for their help in creating this random and taking part in the random discussion.
  
This time the random involves two separate elements.

As is often the case, the winner of the random will be the player who scores the most points overall. When players are equal on points ties will be decided on the closest overall time prediction in random 2. 

Random 1: The Unique Place Called Monaco

As Monaco represents such a different challenge to any other circuit for both driver and car, predict whether the three following drivers will beat their average practice (1, 2 and 3), qualifying and race positions.

Alonso - 4.5 (Practice), 6.5 (Qualifying), 5.5 (Race)
Bottas - 9.5, 7.5, 6.5
Kobayashi - 18.5, 18.5, 15.5

2 points will be scored for a correct answer. No points are scored if a driver retires in the race.

Random 2: Qualifying High Is What Matters

Order the following group of 4 from fastest to slowest in qualifying (this is based on qualifying position before penalties):

Group A

Button

Grosjean

Massa

Raikkonen

Group B

Kvyat

Magnussen

Maldonado

Perez

The tie-break category is the time difference between the fastest and slowest car in the  last session the whole group competed in e.g. if Perez gets knocked out in Q1 then this session would be used for Group B. If someone doesn't set a qualifying time then the next slowest driver will be used etc.

This prediction should be for both groups. 

3 points will be scored for a correct placing for each driver in both Group A and Group B. If your choice is 1 away from the actual result you'll score 2 points, 2 away 1 point etc.

Example:

Eric Boullier predicts - Button, Grosjean, Raikkonen, Massa and the actual order is Raikkonen, Grosjean, Massa, Button then EB scores: 1 for Raikkonen, 3 for Grosjean, 2 for Massa and 0 for Button.

Overall 18 points are available for random 1 and 24 points for random 2. Good luck!

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Feel free to post picks in the following format:

Qualifying: 
Race: 
Constructors: [Not Mercedes as they are banned]
Random:
Random 1
Alonso - H/L, H/L, H/L
Bottas - 
Kobayashi - 

Random 2
Group A - 1, 2, 3, 4
Group B - 1, 2, 3, 4

Time difference
A -
B -

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Last year qualifying decided the race - Rosberg pipped Hamilton and Vettel to pole and then controlled from there. A similar thing is likely to happen again given the importance of track position especially between teammates.

A flashback to the prediction league last year shows a Dragan (Lotus) win followed by both Ferrari drivers. Montezemolo has demanded a repeat from his drivers Joe and Rajaram to get their campaign kick-started.

Remember First Practice is Thursday, Not Friday. Picks are due before FP1 so hopefully everyone does remember. 

Good luck all!

Spain (Round 5) - Results and Championship Standings

I'm going to be unavailable for the next week or so; for the time being I want to post the results but won't be writing my usual write up until I can.

Congratulations to anyone who did well (Nat and Michael in particular) and apologies for the lack up of write-up. Hopefully everyone is happy with the format. Let me know if you have any questions - the random was quite complicated and multi-layered.

Spain 2014 (Round 5) - F1 Prediction League

Welcome to the Spanish GP - round 5 of the 2014 F1 season!  After a three week break, teams will be hoping their substantial upgrade packages work which will see them climb the grid.

This is a pivotal weekend in many respects both in F1 and the prediction league. If Mercedes retain their dominance the Constructors Championship looks increasingly out of the reach for Red Bull and Ferrari, who both desperately need to start closing the gap.  Not to mention that a lead of 100 points in the Constructors Championship means Mercedes will be banned as a Constructors option, meaning that 'Soft Drinks' company may get a few more picks.

This weekend looks like the first all-dry weekend all season and will be fascinating. The million dollar question is whether any team can make a significant step forward - Red Bull, Ferrari, McLaren, Williams, Force India or Lotus? They're all in the hunt if they can find a good set-up for the weekend.

Reflecting the likelihood of Mercedes dominance a more complicated random has again been devised to keep things interesting.  

As always here is a re-cap of the current standings:

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Random

Thanks to Nat for his help in creating this random and taking part in the random discussion.
  
This time the random involves three separate elements.

As is often the case, the winner of the random will be the player who scores the most points overall. When players are equal on points ties will be decided on the closest random 2 points prediction.

Random 1: The Flying Spaniard
How many places will Alonso gain/lose on the opening lap compared to his starting position?

You guess the number, and then are awarded points based on how close you are e.g.
Spot on: 5 points
1 away: 4 points
2 away: 3 points
3 away: 2 points
4 away: 1 point
5 or more away: 0 points

Random 2: The Mighty Update Package
Predict whether a team will score more, the same or less points than that team's average over the four races so far. You must then predict the amount of points they will score with both cars in Spain.

The rounded average points so far over the four races are:

Mercedes 39 points

Red Bull 14 points

Force India 14 points

Ferrari 13 points

McLaren 11 points

Williams 9 points

Toro Rosso 2 points

Lotus 0 points

Sauber 0 points 

A point will be scored for making the right more/same/less option pick. An additional point will be scored if your point prediction is within two points of the correct pick.

There are only two rules:

• You have to predict a points score which reflects the more, same or less points pick you originally made. For example you cannot pick Mercedes higher and pick 37 points as 37 points is lower than their average. If you pick the same option e.g. Sauber, you have no option but to pick the point option listed above, in this case 0 points.
• You must pick a possible points score so 32, 34, 36, 38, 39, 41 and 42 are not options.

Random 3: Super Sector Select
For qualifying, pick one driver for each sector. The aim is to score the lowest overall time using the best sector from the picked drivers from Q1, Q2 or Q3. 

The only rules are that you cannot repeat a driver and you can only use one driver from each team. So you cannot pick: Hamilton, Hamilton, Alonso or Rosberg, Vettel, Ricciardo as they respectively break the two rules above.

Points will be scored based on a scale of 0-10. The best player will score 10 points, the second best player will score 9 points etc. In the event of a tie, both players will score the same amount of points.

For example if position 1 scores 1:24.000, position 2 scores 1:24.000 and position 3 scores 1:24.192. The players who are in P1 and P2 will both score 10 points. P3 will score 8 points.

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Feel free to post picks in the following format:

Qualifying: 
Race: 
Constructors:
Random:
Flying Spaniard:
The Mighty Upgrade Package:
Mercedes - H/S/L X points

Red Bull - H/S/L X points

Force India - H/S/L X points

Ferrari - H/S/L X points

McLaren - H/S/L X points

Williams - H/S/L X points

Toro Rosso - H/S/L X points

Lotus - H/S/L X points

Sauber - H/S/L X points

Super Sector Select:

Sector 1:

Sector 2:

Sector 3:

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Last year Alonso won a race dominated by tyre wear - which was both his last win and Massa's last podium. Only Kimi was able to stay within half a minute. This year they're teammates.

A flashback to the prediction league last year shows the Sauber Constructors team (Kiszol and I) claiming a first and only 1-2 for a constructors team since the start. Sangan also featured on the podium. Interestingly last year's podium are now all separated by one point in the 2014 Drivers Championship.

I think I speak for everyone when I say the random category will be extremely decisive this week so good luck!

As always let me know if you have any questions about the above.

China 2014 Results and Championship Standings (4/19)

After the excitement of the Bahrain race, this race wasn't quite as fun. Still there were some incredible performances (Alonso and Ricciardo) and some tension between Vettel and the Red Bull team which helped to create interest. 

Hamilton's third win in a row solidifies his position as the championship favourite although Rosberg still holds the points advantage. Spain will be fairly pivotal - Rosberg was very strong there last year comparatively so he'll hope that he can produce a strong performance like in Bahrain but this time take a second win of the season.

In the prediction league Ross Brawn has accepted a place at Marussia as Team Principal. He made a very vocal and bullish speech on race day, claiming the minimum target for the team this season was 3rd in the Constructors Championship. Marussia will have an uphill battle given their lack of preparation for the season however some interesting innovations seem to have helped. Adrian Newey was caught breaking into the teams garage with his notebook after the race causing Marussia to sue Red Bull - another incident in a long list of court cases Red Bull have lined up. 

McLaren to take Formula 1 rival Red Bull to court over Dan Fallows

Red Bull made to pay for Formula 1 appeal hearing costs

Ross Brawn publically stated Marussia's number one driver Nat was an "exciting talent - back stronger than ever after a bout of rallying" - and that he planned to give him full support in his quest for points. He did temper expectations in general and warned against expecting big things from Scott, stating he was "lucky and overrated".

Despite initial positively the Marussia team is lacking funds with a 1 Euro budget for salaries each race, all of which has been given to Nat. One leading engineer in the team has emphasised that both drivers could bag up to 5 extra Euros should they win though so there was reason for optimism!

Big congratulations to Dragan (on his record equalling 8th podium - equal with current championship leader Kiszol) and Rose31 on their first podium after only 4 races in the prediction league. Dragan's performance has lifted Lotus even further ahead securing a 27 point lead going into the European season. 

At the top of the Drivers Championship there is a huge clustering between four players (with Dragan close behind). With the increased competitiveness of the Red Bulls and potential bans for Mercedes and their drivers things could get very interesting (I'll keep you informed).

On to the results and the standings...

Championship Standings

Constructors Championship

Read on for more detail.