back to the old days
- This topic has 21 replies, 14 voices, and was last updated 12 years, 8 months ago by
.
- Posts
Back in the beginning f1 points system used to be a little different and I think that it should be reintroduced.
The fastest lap used to yet 1 point.
Imagine all the things we could give a plus 1 to –
– quickest pit stop
– fastest sector
– most overtakes
– most positions gained
Dreadful idea. It would make the scoring system unnecessarily complicated and incomprehensible to the casual fan.
Points should only be given out based on where they finish. Otherwise we could have drivers clinching a championship by doing a low-fuel qualifying run in the middle of a Grand Prix:
keith @ do you not think think things are already unnecessarily complicated and incomprensible to the casual fan!!!
Keith, how will they do a low fuel qualifying run in the middle of a race if refuelling isn’t allowed. They wouldn’t finish the race.
I think that Championship points should only be awarded based on where they finish, but I think there is a possibility to award prizes to drivers who do get the fastest lap. It won’t affect the points situation, so teams in the points won’t consider it a worthwhile gamble to do a run on a fresh set of faster tyres late in the race because it would compromise strategy. But having a whole bunch of drivers pushing towards the end of the race, doing “glory runs” would be entertaining.
Woah… “dreadful idea” is a bit curt. I mean, I’d probably agree it’d be an unnecessary complication, but it’s best not to shoot down reader suggestions like that
I didn’t mean to sound curt, but in my experience this is one of those ideas that people seem to suggest without pausing for a moment to realise it has loads of obvious flaws.
Points decide championships and if you start giving them away for every last little thing then we’re going to see titles won in some very unsatisfactory ways.
I’m not for it in general, and while I can’t imagine a team taking the car into the garage and draining all but a couple fast laps worth of fuel mid way through a race, they could quite easily bolt on a set of brand new tyres two laps from the end to do a brilliant lap.
I remember a few years ago Kimi won the DHL most fastest lap award, or something to that effect, does it still exist?
As Zadak once said…
The DHL thingy doesn’t affect the championship.
Award points for race finish posisions only, anything else is just not needed.
It just seems silly, you would get people driving in ways that maybe for the main purpose of racing: To finish in the highest position.
If only a single point were given for pole or fastest lap, then that is unlikely to decide a championship. If a single point is all that’s needed to mathematically eliminate the competition then sure, doing a low fuel quali-like run in the middle of a race should get you point, but it would hamper a race you were almost certain to get points in anyway, so who cares how that point is earned (perhaps there could be a proviso to say that the fastest lap can only be earned by somebody classified at the end of the race, as this wouldn’t guarantee championship victory any more than sitting in 3rd all race then retiring right at the end). I don’t know if I’d be bothered or not, but a single point for either pole or fastest lap isn’t something I’d rule out. For one thing, as I pointed out in an article, if quali is so special that it deserves it’s own tyres, perhaps the significance of pole should be recognised and complemented with a point for pole.
However, I agree that any more than 1 point would make things confusing to follow. I think even the most casual fan would be able to understand though, if going fastest ‘done gone and got that man a point.’
The only drawback in my mind would be the argument that all of an F1 race weekend is geared solely towards finishing in the best possible position, and that that is all that should be rewarded. It is a fair argument, but when a single point is only 4% the value of a race win I think one can be afforded to be given out.
Perhaps a single point could be given to the constructor (and only constructor) who does the fastest pit stop. This would add confusion, but it’s only the constructors championship, so casual fans are unlikely to care as much lol.
Points for overtaking and gaining most positions would be terrible, it wouldn’t even work.
Everyone would try and start last so Qualifying would just have no one coming out on track to set a lap time.
Then people in the race would try and drop to the back of the grid but that in turn would allow people to overtake them, so everyone would go into the pits to avoid being overtaken properly.
No Qualifying and then the entire race being spent as a stand-off in the pitlane doesn’t sound much fun to me.
I don’t agree either, but it wouldn’t be 1 point per overtake, it would be 1 point for most overtakes. If you intentionally start at the back you might bag that 1 point, but you’d almost certainly miss 25 from a race win. Same for dropping back mid-way through a race. Perhaps it would lead to chaos for all the finishers below 10th- unless a proviso was that the drivers who earned the point had to already finish in the points.
Yeah, I agree that some of the suggestions above are unnecessary, but I think a point for fastest lap sounds like a decent idea if implemented well, such as the suggestions above of it only being available if you finish the race, or finish in the points, as this would stop drivers going out for one quik lap to clinch the title. I think the fastest pitstop idea could also work if points were given to the Constructors Championship.
I think the most overtakes idea wouldn’t really work, because as we saw in Keith’s overtaking statistics, it’s hard to define a “proper” overtake i.e. do first lap passes count, how long must you keep the position, do DRS passes count etc, which would make that idea just way too complicated.
It would be a disaster if championship ended up being won by fastest laps, but surely a scenario where drivers need only a point for fastest lap to become champion are pretty rare…
…then again, now that I think of it Michael Schumacher only needed a single point to win the championship in 2003, and so did Fernando Alonso in 2006. Also, am I right in thinking Lewis Hamilton won the GP2 title with a fastest lap point? I suppose I just took apart my own argument!
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.