F1 Fanatic

Nowadays unless someone atypical wins we seem to almost brush it under the carpet.

Really? I don’t think that at all.

Winning a race is no less important than it was 10, 20, 30, 40 or 50 years ago. If anything, the way the points system is these days, a win is more important now than ever before.

If you look at what happens when a driver wins a race, they get the cameras focus on them at the finish, they get their team radio broadcast to the world, they get to walk through the Aisle of Beautiful Women, they get on the podium to receive a lovely trophy and then the BBC and the rest of the world’s media rush to their team’s motor-home to watch them all celebrate together after the race.

But a single Grand Prix is just a single event, and the World Championship is, literally, 20 times more important than one race. Ultimately, the reason fans watch a Grand Prix is because they want to see who will take the chequered flag on the day, but the reason fans watch every Grand Prix in a season is because they want to see who takes the World Championship, because it’s far more important. I don’t think the World Championship makes any single Grand Prix win less important or significant, though.

That’s an interesting question. Of course, whether or not it’s a bad thing, it’s hear to stay. I suppose race wins are devalued a bit- I have to make a concious effort to think, wow, Vettel’s won a lot of races now. Also, I think it doesn’t help that there have no new race winners for almost 3 years now, as there’s nothing like a debutant victor to remind you why race wins are so special.

An interesting hypothetical sitaution would be to award championship points for qualifying positions, and leave the race to be effectively a ‘friendly’. It’ll never happen, obviously, but it’s interesting to wonder how that might affect the attitudes of drivers and fans to races. Would we still care who won?

A more realistic example would be the ‘dead rubber’ races after a season has been decided. Obviously, we don’t get many these days because Ecclestone has historically looked to rig the championships a bit (yes, I’m a tin hat wearer), but we’re almost certainly going to get one or two come autumn, so it’ll be interesting to see how we react to them. I remember the Abu Dhabi 2009 weekend as being one of the most boring events I have ever witnessed… but on the flip side, there have been some good dead rubber races- Suzuka 2005 being the most obvious one.

I think that having several smaller championships within a season would be a good idea.
It’s possible to have a World Championship still, with some races losing their status. On the other hand, they will become part of a 4-6 race cup focused on scoring the most points in races divided along the lines of geography or culture.

It would prevent the World Championship from becoming too congested, but would give some rounds like Abu Dhabi something that will attract the teams. Even if the Championship looks set to be dominated by one particular driver, there is still a chance for other teams to grab a cup or two.

Using the 2012 calendar, I would divide them into.

European Cup (for races primarily in Western Europe)
1. Spain
2. Monaco
3. Valencia
4. Silverstone
5. Germany
6. Spa
7. Monza

Continental Cup (races in Eastern Europe, Middle East)
1. Turkey (subject to contract extension)
2. Hungary
3. Bahrain
4. Abu Dhabi

Asian Cup
1. Malaysia
2. China
3. Singapore
4. Japan
5. Korea
6. India

International Cup
1. Australia
2. Brazil
3. Canada
4. United States

The records will be looked at in the future, at the present we only care about the show. The Championship is made up of many races, that’s why a race is worth less, and the more the races, the smaller the importance of each of them, because one can afford to lose a race but not the Championship, which is more important. The number of races shouldn’t be increased.
Then there are also the cars’ performances that play a role: if a team is always winning, you already predict one of their drivers for the win before the race starts, and when he eventually does it isn’t something you did not expect.

This is a really great thread.

I don’t think less of individual race wins. I wouldn’t say I get really excited as my Ferrari bias tends to get in the way but I appreciate it when someone wins. I do get excited however when a different driver wins at an event he never has before such as when Jensen won at China, when a driver adds to an impressive tally Massa’s pole positions at Brazil or Schumacher winning at France, or when there’s some emotion behind it such as Fernando winning for the first time at Monza in a Ferrari (that meant almost as much to me than him possibly winning the title that year).

I know this is very daft but on F1 games I absolutely love it when I win at a new GP but I’m just trying to show that I appreciate each event in its own right.

I don’t really see the point of non-championship races but perhaps if they were somewhere completely different like an oval then that might be fun however, I’d always feel bad for whoever did win it but didn’t get any points for it (although maybe that’s kind of the point :P). What I’d really love to see is drivers competing for the Triple Crown again and trying out different series but with calendar clashes, the corporate world of F1 and media days that’s likely to never happen but I’d much prefer that to non-championship events.

I have a bit of a migraine too so if anything I said was a tad nonsensical please excuse me!

Indycar have 5 driver’s titles awared each year, or some such. Overall Winner, Rookie of the Year, Indy 500 Winner, Road Course Champion, Oval Course Champion.

WOuld be good if F1 included this as well. The rookie with the most points at the end of the year usually gets a brief mention, but there’s no trophy or anything. Perez and di Resta are currently tied on 2 points for that one.

Street Circuit Champion would tally up the points scored around Albert Mark, Monaco, Valencia, Montreal and Marina Bay and name a driver as Champion of the Streets, or something.

You could split the racing circuits into Traditional and Tilke, maybe? Tilke Champion with the most points from the Malaysia, China, Turkey, Korea, India & Abu Dhabi races?

Traditional being the highest points scorer from the Spain, Britain, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Belgium, Japan and Brazil races.

Then as David S has mentioned above, have a champion of each region too.

Gives everyone more to play for, and will leave many more ‘titles’ open till the end.

Screw it, I’m gonna find some time to work out who would have won these hypothetical awards last year.

Nice work! Might have to include something like this on the main site, especially the rookies one.