Austria 2014 (Round 8) - F1 Prediction League

Austria promises to be an interesting race. For one, it's nice to return to an old track especially as there were a number of entertaining races at the old A1 ring. Unfortunately the event is still heavily linked with the Ferrari team order debacle in 2002. The debate was even more intense as Schumacher, with four wins out of five, was already in a commanding position in the championship. The decision was made by Todt which had wide ranging repercussions including a ban of team orders for eight years. Schumacher was so embarrassed by the situation that he gifted Barrichello a win at Indianapolis later in the year.

Despite this I'm looking forward to the race, safe in the knowledge that Mercedes won't give similar team orders. I feel like the Red Bull Ring will offer up another tense battle in the race for the championship. 

For those of who you never watched/don't remember, here is a video of the pole lap from the last race here in 2003. It's a fairly high speed circuit with plenty of aggressive corners, really showing off the power/noise and downforce performance of the early 2000 cars.

Due to my slowness in posting the results thread (apologies, things will get back to normal now that I've returned from holiday - see link for results thread), I should congratulate Keba, Dragan and Joe for their places on the podium.

Canada was a great race and Ricciardo's victory was very popular throughout the paddock. Red Bull were ultimately strong but were pushed hard by both Williams and the Force India cars. Hopefully we'll see similar battles this weekend throughout the field. Also will we see Rosberg win a third race in a row? 

Just to confirm Mercedes are still banned (Hamilton and Rosberg still eligible). However the increasing dominance of Mercedes and Red Bull has led me towards a unique idea for random.

Here is the current championship standings:

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Random

Thanks to Michael for his help in creating this random.
  
This time the random is similar to the usual qualifying, race and constructors picks. However for each you must make two picks (in addition to your usual picks). Given the dominance of the Mercedes and Red Bull packages Hamilton, Rosberg, Mercedes, Ricciardo, Vettel and Red Bull are all banned.

So you must choose two drivers for qualifying and two drivers for race. These can be repeated between category e.g. you could choose Hulkenberg in both qualifying and race. The driver you feel has the best chance of winning without Mercedes and Red Bull should be placed first as this will affect the amount of points you score. The same is true for the two constructors picks you make. See the scoring table below.

The player with the highest overall point score will win the random. 

Tie-break

Of the four drivers who have raced at the Spielberg track in F1 - Raikkonen, Button, Alonso and Massa - which driver will gain the most positions from their starting position? How many places? If a tie still exists after this, time of posting will be the decider. 

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Template

Feel free to post picks in the following format:

Qualifying: 
Race: 
Constructors: [Not Mercedes as they are banned]
Random:
Qualifying
Driver 1 -
Driver 2 -
Race
Driver 1 -
Driver 2 -
Constructors
Team 1 -
Team 2 -
Driver to gain most places and quantity: Raikkonen/Button/Alonso/Massa

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Last time the race was held in Austria Ferrari and McLaren were both in the running for the World Championship (along with Williams). F1 has changed significantly since then with the emergence of Red Bull and the Mercedes team (obviously both were in F1 under different names, Jaguar and BAR respectively). 

Both Ferrari and McLaren have stated their commitment to bringing new parts to the car in Austria. Will this be enough to see them challenge for an unlikely podium?

As always picks are due before Free Practice 1 (Friday 20th June 09:00 GMT). See you soon!