China 2014 (Round 4) - F1 Prediction League

Two weeks after an incredible Bahrain race and we're arriving into China for round 4 of the F1 prediction league 2014!

Big changes at the top with Stefano Domenicali leaving Ferrari and Bob Bell leaving Mercedes. Meanwhile McLaren are in the background poaching staff everywhere. Did someone mention a possible Ross Brawn Ferrari return too?

Who would have thought that Ferrari dominated China just a year ago. The change in Pirelli tyres and the RB resurgence put an end to that and Ferrari have really struggled since.

China is the last round before substantial upgrades/changes will be brought to Europe. This could be Mercedes' last race with a clear advantage with the pursuing group looking to close that gap. I however feel Mercedes are almost uncatchable this year. Unless a team can gain 1-2 seconds over a very short space of time, this championship looks like it's heading to the Brackley based team.

As always here is a re-cap from the standings:
 

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Random

Thanks to Kiszol, Michael and Sangan for their help in creating this random and taking part in the random discussion.
  
Random contains five distinct questions. The emphasis is mainly on risk vs. rewards. The choice of what to pick is entirely you're own but if you fail and pick an incorrect answer you'll obviously come away with 0 points.

The winner of the random will be the player who scores the most points overall. Tie-breaks will be decided on the highest lowest round (which scored points) and continue up until a winner is decided. The second tie-break is decided on posting time (the earlier the better).

Just to illustrate the above. If one player scores 1, 2, 3, 5, 0 and another scores 2, 3, 3, 2, 1 then the second player wins. The 0 is discounted from the analysis, then we look at the highest lowest round 1 v 1, tie. Move on, 2 v 2. Tie, move on. 3 v 2. Player 2 wins. This is to stop players from picking too conservatively and to remove the element of perhaps one extremely lucky pick giving a complete edge to a player (e.g. Chilton being third after a safety car).
 

Q1: Name a driver who will finish at least one lap in the top 3 positions in the race.
A:
Hamilton / Rosberg - 1 point
Vettel - 2 points
Ricciardo / Alonso - 3 points
Hulkenberg / Raikkonen / Button / Perez / Bottas / Massa - 4 points
Magnussen - 5 points

Vergne / Kvyat - 6 points
Sutil / Gutierrez / Maldonado / Grosjean - 7 points
Chilton / Bianchi / Ericsson / Kobayashi - 10 points

Q2: Name a team which qualifies at least one car in the top eight positions (an extra bonus point will be given if both drivers qualify top eight, two extra bonus points if both drivers qualify top six (excluding Mercedes)).
A:
Mercedes: 1 point
Red Bull: 2 points
Force India/Ferrari/Williams: 3 points
McLaren: 4 points
Toro Rosso: 6 points
Sauber/Lotus: 7 points
Caterham/Marussia: 10 points

Q3: Which driver will qualify the most positions in front of his own teammate? (Penalties do not count - result based on provisional grid before penalties. A team with a disqualified driver counts as 0 points regardless of which driver is disqualified. Tie-breaks decided by highest position).
Best answer - 5 points
2nd, 3rd - 4 points
4th, 5th - 3 points
6th, 7th, 8th - 2 points
9th, 10th, 11th - 1 point
Driver picked out-qualified - 0 points

Q4: Pick one Driver A (e.g. Sutil) to beat their Driver B (e.g. Maldonado) in the race.  A retirement in your pairing results in 0 points being scored. I've used a random generator to generate 12 random options - I've assigned points to each of these options. A bonus point goes to the result which has the greatest margin of victory/lowest margin of defeat (based on time, not position).

Sutil - Maldonado 1 point
Bottas - Massa 1 point
Massa - Räikkönen 2 points
Button - Vettel 3 points
Magnussen - Vettel 4 points
Vergne - Bottas 4 points
Vergne - Button 5 points
Kvyat - Ricciardo 5 points
Grosjean - Hulkenberg 6 points
Bottas - Hamilton 7 points
Bianchi - Button 8 points
Ericsson - Ricciardo 8 points

Q5: Predict the finishing position of Kimi Räikkönen in the race.

Correct: 4 points
One away: 3 points
Two away: 2 points
Within three: 1 point
Outside: 0 points
Kimi retires/isn't classified: 0 points

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Template

Feel free to post picks in the following format:

Qualifying: 
Race: 
Constructors:
Random:
Q1 -
Q2 -
Q3 -
Q4 -
Q5 -

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Alonso will be hoping that lightning strikes again. So will a charger by the name of ediglo, hoping to repeat the form which took him to an unprecedented debut win. I for one will be supporting this (this has nothing to do with us being teammates... Vamos Williams!... I mean may the best team win).

Good luck everyone!