Actually this rule might be a disadvantage to Ferrari this year. Kimi was strangely off form last year. I would expect him to return to more winning in 09 and that means he and Massa will be taking wins away from each other. Meanwhile, teams like Renault and McLaren (assuming the cars are fast enough to win) have only one really strong driver who will be taking all of the wins for the team.
we could have someone win 4 races and not finish another race all season - and they would beat someone with 3 wins and who finished EVERY race in a points scoring position. how on earth can that be considered a fair system ?
What's to stop teams from building cars that work well around certain types of tracks...so they can get the wins and hope to with a championship that way?
I think we'll see a large push in development right now so that the cars will win a couple races and get a lead in the championship and then completely drop this year's car and work on next year's car. Major advantage to the team that is able to clinch the driver's championship early (even potentially during the summer) leaving them almost 7 or 8 months of 100% devotion to next season.
Indeed, I highly doubt that Heikki will get more than 1 or 2 wins this year with McLaren pushing all their resources to LH.
Hmmmm yeah i see your point, but i can't see that happening really because, know one has had that many wins in a season to wrap it up so early that know one can catch them for years. take last season IF Massa didn't win in brazil LH and Massa would of both been on 5 race wins, so it would have gone to points which LH won also. Same story with last year except Kimi wasn't ahead on points either.
Going along with this train of thought, anybody thought of the amount of non or near impossible overtaking tracks, like Monaco, all the cars set up to be on pole, knowing full well as along as this is achieved they can sit back in other races, like you said they can switch off when they have a few in the bag, the more I think of it, the more it's a backward move, for us as fans.
I feel this issue was rammed home to Bernie in Brazil, he was not happy that Lewis only had to finish 5th to win the WDC. But yet even if we disregard the pathetic FIA penalties to allow Massa to catch up it still was a great battle, and both drivers deserved praise. The FOTA had proposed 12-9-7-5-4-3-2-1 why was this rejected!! a point's system understood by the fans. Remember M Schumacher IIRC last years system was introduced after MS ran away with the WC early on!! and thus it became viewers were turning off in the droves and IMO this new system could quite easily create the possibility of that happening again.
If only the Ferret and Smacks were in charge of, well, you name the professional sport; baseball, football, hockey, basketball, etc., life would be wonderful. Think of it, no more lengthy octofinals, quarterfinals, semifinals and finals on TV stretching into months and months of appalling boredom. I'd love for the lot of them to be declared Champs immediately upon winning more games during regular season than anyone else. Thanks very much, here's your Cup, here's the parade and here's your clubs, now get lost. Ahhh, Paradise. The Gruesome Twosome missed their calling.
Address FERRARI being penalized for winning! Far more pertinent issue. Sure MS ran away with a couple of seasons. Thats the goal to win. They shut that down with a tire rule and you are worried about points? Too funny. Points are for every spot but the guy who finishes first and has the best time on the podium. No system is perfect and Im sure this one wont be. It is about wins again and all of you are upset?
Dave, I admire you flying in the face of public opinion here, but your making out as if the drivers never went for the win, think about the engine conservation, the FIA want the engines to last, restrictions, tracks near impossible to overtake, factors in previous years that have made car's aero design's impossible to overtake, now if they don't blow there engines up trying to win is it not racing..? I like F1 for the reasons that it takes alot of factors to become a WDC not just winning a few races, the WCC means something to me as well. I read somewhere that they tried this system with bikes, it was wrapped up within 6 races.. So now we have that the WDC could be over mid season, if a driver cannot win they might as well park the car in the nearest lake, Team orders will have to be decided early on, and the driver with the most point's may not end up being be the WDC!! And I'am sure there is a whole lot of other thing's wrong with it. The FIA in there infinite wisdom at this late hour, decide to change a system that worked!! albeit it needed tweaking maybe, but this is sheer madness IMO. This system is far from perfect....but I hope I'am proved wrong for the sake of the sport.
Super Steve, Good points made and well taken. I will throttle back on my enthusiasm as I know the system is not perfect as I stated. I wasnt aware of the bike failure with this. That said a winner should get the benefit of the effort and to make this work the restrictions stated should be eliminated, ideally, for this to work. They wont be and Im not holding my breath. Im willing to give it an honest go as it did happen so close to the start and it does make for interesting typing on the keyboard here . Good luck to all who race this year and for now the suspense has only begun. I hope our worst fears posted here about someone running away early are not realized and another good close title chase emerges, without controversey or notoriety to the negative for the sport. I appreciate your well thought out post here.
Hmmm - Barbazza made a really good point - The more I think on this, the more I believe it could hurt Ferrari (and, possibly on testing form, Brawn...) Mclaren: LH is the only "winner" Renault: Fred BMW: RK (?) A "reasonable" scenario: After say, 6 races, we've got LH, FM and KR all with two wins - Who's gonna be "anointed" as the #1 at Ferrari? As Steve said, what he hell was wrong with 12-9-7-5-4-3-2-1 or similar? BTW - Is, I love your "ferret and smacks" reference - Very good! Cheers, Ian
No problem Dave, it wouldn't do for us all to think the same .... Let us hope it's not as bad as I'am trying to make it out to be...your point's/and enthusiasm are great..
You can always tell an insecure/inept manager by his institution of "change for the sake of change" policies to mask deficiencies in ability.
+100 If the FOTA had suggested this new win count only rule, Max would have insisted on 12-9-7-5-4-3-2-1.
Of course he would! I think that we should be looking at all of the FIA proposal as an entirety, crafted to counter the incipient FOTA threat to its authority (ie revenue stream) and not become too fixated on a single aspect. IMHO these radical changes are designed just to move the power struggle between the two groups to another level.
I'am thinking you should take, Porno-mad-in-the-head-pain-in-the-a$$-Max's..job Dave, because your always one step ahead.. Seriously, I think your probably right..
Maybe not. After two weeks in one of your former colonies where the only sports talk was about the test match I still can't figure out the game.
Tell me about it I'm clueless regards cricket, however I believe it's another game we invented, and get regularly taught how to win it by everyone else, Ask the Aussie's 2nd thought's don't!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
My eyes glazed over when they told me that when you're in you're out and when you're out you're in. Tank G*d for NCAA B-Ball.
