There continues to be discussion about the current F1 points system. At the moment it is:
10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1
This system was introduced after the 2002 season which Michael Schumacher wrapped up in record time. He won it at the French GP in July!
The season wasn’t due to finish until October. The championship had been won, and yet there were still three months of the season left. For F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone, this was an absolute disaster.
This points system was introduced to make championships closer, and to avoid championships being won so early.
However in 2004 Schumacher won the title early again despite this change. Fans also started moaning that there was not much motivation to win races, as drivers only gained two extra points.
This has become more of an issue over the past two or three seasons, when we have had close championships and not enough battles at the front.
Therefore, Bernie Ecclestone wants to abolish the points altogether and replace them with medals.
Is this a step too far? Or could it really improve the show? Would it be fair?
Let’s look at the concept of Bernie’s idea and assess all the pros and cons.
The Concept
Instead of the championship being decided by the driver with most points, the driver who wins the most gold medals would win the driver’s championship.
A gold medal would be given for a race win, a silver medal for second and bronze for third.
So in other words it’s the drivers with the most wins who is WDC. In the event of drivers winning the same number of gold medals, it would then be decided by who got the most silver medals. If drivers win the same amount of gold and silver medals, it would go down to bronze medals and so on.
On the other hand, the Constructors Championship would continue to be decided by the points system as it is currently.
If we used the 2008 championship as an example, Lewis Hamilton wouldn’t have been champion. Felipe Massa would have been declared champion due to the fact that he won 6 races over Hamilton’s 5.
Lewis Hamilton and Felipe Massa would have gone into the Brazilian GP with 5 wins each. So whoever won the race would have won the championship, as opposed to Lewis Hamilton having to finish in 5thplace to be WDC.
The 2008 championship with Bernie’s system would have looked like this:
Felipe Massa 6 Gold Medals
Lewis Hamilton 5 Gold Medals
Kimi Raikkonen 2 Gold Medals
Fernando Alonso 2 Gold Medals
Robert Kubica 1 Gold Medal
Kimi Raikkonen finishes above Fernando Alonso due to having one more silver medal.
The Pros of the Medal system
It sounds a crazy and radical idea, but there are some real positives to this system. At the moment fans moan that there aren’t enough battles for the win in modern F1.
There are many championship contending drivers happy to finish 2nd and take the points. With drivers having to conserve long life engines, and gearboxes the motivation to battle for the victory is removed even more.
If a driver is 5-10 seconds behind the leader is there any point taking risks and risking unreliability in the next race just for two measly points? Many drivers feel it, isn’t so stick to getting the eight points.
In Valencia this season for example, Lewis Hamilton decided very early on just to accept second place. There isn’t enough reward to take big risks. Due to this, the last part of a F1 race can be extremely tedious. The race may as well be over after the final pit stops.
With the medal system all the leading contenders would want to leave the race with a gold medal. They simply have to get gold medals as they won’t win the championship without them.
This completely changes the philosophy of how the drivers approach the race weekend. Drivers will giving everything to win the race because they know they have to.
Even if they are over 10 seconds behind they will have to keep on pushing and pushing. Drivers may risk a big lunge on another driver to take the lead of the race. Teams will be adopting tactics to win the race rather than just to get a good number of points for the championship.
Drivers are more likely to throw caution to the wind on a consistent basis. We rarely see that these days. We want to see the best drivers in the world being on the limit for the whole race, and being on the absolute ragged edge. We want them to forget about conserving the car as that won’t win them championships under this system.
Races certainly have the potential to be far more entertaining, and feature more edge of the seat action.
Title deciding races also have the possibility to become more exciting. 2007 is a great example of this. With two races remaining, four drivers were on four wins each. This system would really have opened that season’s title battle even more. It would have gone to the last race and all four drivers would have entered the championship finale with a chance to win the title.
That would have been worth watching, and we would have ended up with an even more thrilling conclusion than we actually got. All 4 of them would have been trying to win the race in order to win the championship.
In 2006 Michael Schumacher and Fernando Alonso would have both gone to Brazil with 7 wins (gold medals) each. They would have both been battling to win the race in order to win the championship, as opposed to Schumacher hoping Alonso would finish out of the points.
That would have made a thrilling finale, as the 2007 scenario would. And as mentioned earlier, this season Hamilton and Massa would have gone to Brazil on five wins each. Again we would have seen championship contenders having to go and battle each other for the win to be champion.
Another pro is that for the general public the system is very easy to understand. Practically all sports fans have watched the Olympic Games at some point, and will comprehend the concept of gold, silver and bronze medals.
The Cons of the Medal system
So there is no doubt that this system would improve the show and make F1 more dramatic, particularly at the front of the field. However as good as this sounds there are an awful lot of drawbacks which need to be considered.
Winning a championship isn’t just about wins. It’s about being consistent, not making too many errors, along with the ability to fight back from a misfortune earlier on in the race.
A driver should be rewarded for being consistent throughout the season. One driver may have won the most races but they may have made mistakes and crashed in all the other races.
Another driver on the other hand may have won one or two races less, but still finished high up in the races they didn’t win and only made 1 or 2 mistakes overall. So in this type of scenario it may be a bit unfair that they don’t get the championship.
If something goes wrong early on in the race (like a lost front wing) then the chances of winning the race are minimal. This means that a driver’s motivation to carry on may not be very high. The ability to rescue points from these situations has always been part of being a good champion.
The handful of points taken away after setbacks can often decide a championship. Under this system, a great recovery driver from 20th to third or fourth position would be practically meaningless as it would be unlikely to help as driver’s championship campaign.
A great drive like this may be even better than the drive by the winner but there would be no reward at all.
In the last few seasons, only two teams have come into the season with a car that can consistently win races and finish on the podium. This means that out of a grid of 20 to 24 drivers only a handful will win medals.
What have the rest of the grid got left to play for? Finishing fourth or fifth on a regular basis will no longer win you four or five points. They won’t get anything for their efforts. This might make competing for these drivers seem a bit pointless and dull at times.
Even worse a driver that gets a lucky win at some point in the season, but no other results in the season, would finish in the championship above drivers who regular in finish in what are currently points paying positions.
Giancarlo Fisichella in 2003 is a very good example. He was in a slow Jordan all year long but won the crazy wet Brazilian GP. He finished the season in 12th but would have moved to eighth in the championship above more consistent drivers under the medals system.
In the pros section, we saw how there is the potential for dramatic championship deciders, but on the other hand the season could be finished very early on in the season.
Let's say it’s a 16-race season. If a driver wins the first 9 races then there is no chance for that driver to be caught up. The championship would be won there and then.
The rest of the season would become very tedious as the championship would no longer be up for grabs, and drivers who don’t have top three worthy cars don’t have anything to compete for either.
A driver winning nine races in a row is a bit unrealistic though (it has never been done before in fact in F1) but it’s not impossible. But by race 10, it could be possible to have a four- or five-win lead, which in the remaining six races would be very hard to overhaul. It would be as good as over.
Another issue could be team orders coming a bigger issue again. It’s possible that a team may decide to back only one driver. It’s possible that two drivers in one team could be so close that they could take race wins off each other.
This would be a major disadvantage if they are up against a team where there is a clear number one driver. It means a team boss may need to make, what would be a very unfair sacrifice, on one of his drivers to help win the drivers’ championship.
There is no doubt that a team that has a clear No. 1 has a big advantage in this system. And as a driver, establishing yourself as a clear No. 1 within your team, would be one of the keys to being champion.
Fans would rather see both team mates battling each other rather than one being forced to hold back, and maybe even being made to stop the number 1 driver in the main rival team.
Retiring from a race could be a very big punishment under the medals system. If you retire from the lead, and give a victory to your main rival it could have a large impact on if you win the title or not.
If the retirement is due to a mistake, then fair enough, but if it’s due to reliability, then it’s very harsh. The swing in race victories it would give to the rival driver would be very significant, possible unfair.
Lastly, the record books would be affected. Drivers wouldn’t be scoring points anymore, so it would be harder to compare current drivers to drivers of the past in terms of point scoring totals. Drivers who had a consistent career of scoring fourth-eighth in races wouldn’t have much to show for their career in terms of statistics.
Conclusion
With this proposal I think most fans can see where Bernie is coming from. Putting the emphasis on winning races will certainly create a far better spectacle than we have currently.
However the main problem is that however entertaining the medals system would make F1 it just isn’t fair. Drivers who finish consistently on the podium will not be rewarded, and great recovery drives from lower positions will be practically meaningless. These should be important aspects of winning the championship as well as winning races.
In 1982, Keke Rosberg only won one race but he was still a very deserving champion nonetheless. In the future drivers, could win the championship under the medal system, but not have won it had the points system still been in place.
This applies to Ayrton Senna in 1988, when only the best 11 results counted. If there had been a points system in place, Alain Prost would have been champion.
It’s worth noting that there is a sense this idea has only been put onto the table, as a knee jerk reaction to the fact the 2008 runner-up won more races than the champion.
The points system got changed after the terrible 2002 system. Now the majority of F1 fans moan about that system so the medals proposal could very well end up suffering that same fate.
Making F1 entertaining isn’t just down to the scoring system. If F1 cars could follow each other more easily then drivers would try and overtake more. What’s the point of fighting hard to catch the leader up if you then have next to no chance of getting past?
Hopefully next year’s new aero regs can go some way to solving that problem. Having to conserve engines and gearboxes also doesn’t help the spectacle as this takes away from the drivers being able to push.
This at times turns F1 into an endurance series, despite the fact that races are only around 90 minutes.
So maybe continuing to work on more overtaking-friendly cars, and stop all these silly rules where key parts of the car have to be conserved would be better than changing to a very radical scoring system.
Having said that, the scoring system certainly could do with a change. Arguably it shouldn’t have been changed in 2003 in the first place.
The system should be 12-8-6-5-4-3-2-1. There is more incentive to win the race and consistency is still rewarded. I think this is the small change required in the points system rather than the radical medals system.
However as most people who watch F1 are casual fans entertainment is what’s required for them. This is why Bernie may decide to revert to the medals system, which will be good for attracting more casual fans to watch F1 but will seriously divide the hardcore and experienced F1 fans.
There needs to be considered thought before making a rash decision, which could completely change the face of F1 racing as this system no-doubtedly would.
20 comments Last one added 7 months ago — Leave a Comment
Paul Murtagh 7 months ago
The only plus I can see from the medal situation is rewarding the win more than it currently does. But personally I hope that Bernie doesn't lose his marbles and that the points system is kept. I would like to see the points system be tweaked to 12-8-6-5-4-3-2-1 or 10-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 so that the win has more meaning
Edit Comment Cancel
D-Boy 7 months ago
Well said. VERY well said. Simple fact is if Bernie wants to reward winning more, why not just do as Paul mentioned above and add some points to finishing first? Its clear to me that Bernie isn't thinking clearly nowadays.
Edit Comment Cancel
Billy Sexton 7 months ago
This is a great article Daniel and earns my pick of the day. You have put the agruments across for both sides clearly and this helps people decide for themselves.
The only reason I would say no to medals is because of the chance that the season will be over within a few months. I think that toward the middle/end of the season, all teams back one driver to try and score points and even wins, in 2008 Hamilton, Massa, Kubica, Alonso and Vettel were all prioritised over their team mates.
Great article.
Edit Comment Cancel
Craig Dalrymple 7 months ago
Ok, so we have focused on the drivers. How about the constructors? If we take 2008, then
Ferrari, 8 gold, 4 silver, 7 bronze
McLaren, 6 gold, 3 silver, 4 bronze
BMW, 1 gold, 7 silver, 3 bronze
Renault, 2 gold, 2 silver, 0 bronze
Toyota, 0 gold, 1 silver, 1 bronze
STR, 1 gold, 0 silver, 0 bronze
Red Bull, 0 gold, 0 silver, 0 bronze
Williams, 0 gold, 1 silver, 1 bronze
Honda, 0 gold, 0 silver, 1 bronze
So who wins as constructor?
If you count just golds, then:
Ferrari with 8
Mclaren with 6
Renault with 2
BMW and STR tied with 1 (use 7 silvers with BMW as tie breakers?)
Nobody else ranks because they didn't win a race.
Note that Renault would be second and BMW would be tied for THIRD with STR. If you use the silvers as a tie-break, then BMW is a solid third. However, they CONSISTENTLY finished higher than Renault, so how come they are in 4th?
If you count total medals, then:
Ferrari with 19
McLaren with 13
BMW with 11,
Renault with 4
Toyota and Williams tied with 2
STR, Red Bull, and Honda tied with 1 (gold is tie breaker?)
I think Williams would be happy this way, but STR would be pissed.
Does either system seem fair?
If they still use a points system to rate the constructors, then why bother with medals?
Edit Comment Cancel
D-Boy 7 months ago
Bernie stated that the current points system would be utilized for the Constructor's Championship.
Edit Comment Cancel
Craig Dalrymple 7 months ago
As I said, whats the point? If you get a team like Toro Roso that is up and coming and they can finish both cars at 5th or higher every race its possible for them to win the constructors championship with out ever wining a race.
Edit Comment Cancel
Isuru Wakishta Arachchi 7 months ago
are you on weed? just kidding :)
Edit Comment Cancel
Craig Dalrymple 7 months ago
No, think about it.
Massive rule changes next year. Lets say Lewis, Felipe, and Kimi end up the season with 3 golds apiece and only Felipe has a silver, the rest always finished lower than third in their other races. BMW and Honda consistently finished in the top five. Who gets the constructors championship?
18 races, figure for 10 of them BMW finished second and third (10X8+10X6=140) and above 6th place for the remaining 8 (that would be an average of 7 points per race). That's 196 points right there. Without knowing where the previous named three finished other than below third place, that means that McLaren have 30 points and Ferrari have 68. They would have a pretty sizable deficit to make up when you aren't placing higher than fourth for the remaining races. If you figure a 4th and 5th place Ferrari finish for the remaining 12 races thats 108 more points. Plus the 68 from above, that's 176 points.
Yeah, there is a lot of "if"s above, but remember there are some pretty major rule changes for next year. Besides the immediate affect these have, think about the reliably issues that KERS and slick tires will introduce into the mix. Yeah, I said slick tires and reliability -- don't forget, more grip on the road means increased forces on all other suspension components. Oh, and if you don't think BMW could score 10 finishes in 2nd and/or third place, note that they ruled 2nd place finishes in 2008 with 7, and 3 third places. And that's even AFTER they stopped developing the car....
The mathematical possibilities are insane.
Edit Comment Cancel
Craig Dalrymple 7 months ago
Oh, BTW, 5* and pick
Edit Comment Cancel
Ian Walsh 7 months ago
I think it's a good thought (the medals), but the measure of a true champion is consistency and the current points system shows that.
Edit Comment Cancel
Michael Griffin 7 months ago
So if someone plummets to last and finishes second, with the greatest performance we have ever seen, the commentators will immediately go "that was great but pointless"
If this happens, watch the title race done by Valencia.
Great article mate, pick and stars of course.
Edit Comment Cancel
Gail Mrs Gray 7 months ago
Bernie Ecclestone is crazy, the drivers will not go with that pathetic idea.they say has we grow older our mind goes, well i think Bernies has a long time ago, crazy old man no-wonder his wife wants a divorce he is off his trolley.
Edit Comment Cancel
Isuru Wakishta Arachchi 7 months ago
you guys are so unkind to bernie here. he's about to loose BILLIONS and a nice chik(used to be). so have pity on him.
on a more serious note now...
before i make my explanation below, let me make my positions clear here.
i am for restoring 12-8-6-5-4-3-2-1 system and i don't think medal system is better.
i think this is an almost perfect article so i give 4 stars and POTD for this.
but there is some mis-information in this article that needs correction.
the author clearly states that bernie is to introduce the medal system only to decide WDC and WCC will be decided with the good old 10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1 system. by virtue of that, all the statements like below, quoted from article are not true. why? because drivers are paid employees of constructors and they have more than enough motivation to win points for the constructor. the point system also can be used as a reference to see where the driver stack up because the constructors points is an aggregate of indivudual driver's points and without drivers points there is no contrsutors points as well. the only difference would be that drivers points don't count towards the WDC.
So all statements like below in the article are what i call misinformation.
"a great recovery driver from 20th to third or fourth position would be practically meaningless"
"What have the rest of the grid got left to play for? Finishing fourth or fifth on a regular basis will no longer win you four or five points. "
Edit Comment Cancel
Daniel Chalmers 7 months ago
Thats a fair point, drivers will still be fighting to do well for their team in the constructors championship.
But at the same time that isn't the championship that they care about as much so the ones that can't win medals may not be very motivated just to compete for their team in the constructors.
The best they can hope for is the big teams see their progress and sign them. Thats what they would have to work towards.
Edit Comment Cancel
James Walker 7 months ago
I dont think the medal idea will work, I like the current points system however more should be offered for a win, maybe 12 instead of 10 and keep the rest as it is.
Also why not award points for pole position and the fastest lap? 2 points for poll, 1 point for fastest lap? In my eyes it would make things more competitive as people will be battling harder to earn the additional points.
Edit Comment Cancel
Isuru Wakishta Arachchi 7 months ago
i think giving points for pole and fastest lap is an overkill. the pole position is duely rewarded anyway in the race. isn't it? to set a fastest time a driver should ideally distance him from close fights and that to me contribute adversely to the excitement.
giving more points for the most dominant driver i.e. the one most likely to win pole, win the race, set the fastest lap can finish the WDC pretty early on in the season and that's not the idea at all. what we want is more overtaking and closer fights and i don't see how rewarding pole and fastest lap can do that.
Edit Comment Cancel
Glen Holloway 7 months ago
I can see where bernie is coming from but i still think its a completly stupid idea. It could potentially end the championship very early, and will make teams use team orders form very early on in the season.
Can someone tell me what was wrong with the last 4 seasons? 3 went down to the last race and 1 went down to the last two. last season was one of the most competative and exciting seasons ever! I really think Formula one shoots itself in the foot far too often. Just as the regulations are settled and the racing is good they change everything. I could understand when Schumacher was winning everything and even I struggled to watch a GP with enthusiasm, but now it just sees stupid.
I say if anything needs changing at all, why not revert to the tried and tested 10-6-4-3-2-1.
But i think many constructors would drop out if only the top 6 were awarded points, so i say something like this would satisfy both sides 15-12-10-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 with the top ten reciving points but more reward for winning and gaining a podium.
But i guess we'll see what the FIA have to say on the matter.
Great article by the way, very balanced agrument, 5 stars.
Edit Comment Cancel
D-Boy 7 months ago
You know, reading some of the above discussion... I think I know what's going on here. Bernie's not simply being stupid, he's JEALOUS! He's jealous that a "lowly" series like NASCAR has a points system confusing enough that you'd expect a much more complex series like F1 to use it. So now he wants to introduce something the can cause too many confusing possibilities between the Constructor's and Driver's championships.
Bernie, just drop it. With the economy in the shitter NASCAR won't be able to mount a challenge against F1. All it will ever do is be the top dog of US motorsport(and even that's not guaranteed with the current economic crisis), so just play in your Asian and Middle Eastern sandboxes and don't worry about what we're doing here. We don't like you, anyway, so if you leave our racing alone we won't bother yours.
Edit Comment Cancel
Alex Cowley 7 months ago
It's nonsense pure and simple...what's the point of a system which only rewards the best teams? Will it promote overtaking...yes at the top but what about the rest of the midfield, what's the point of racing if you know you never will win a race.
Ok only Force India didn't get a podium this year which means that they wouldn't have been on the table but this year was extraordinary.
What happens if we have a year like 2007 when only Ferrari and Mclaren got onto the podium on more than two occasions?...It would be so much easier to add extra points for the win 12-8-6-5 etc. Anyway the dark secret behind this is that Bernie wants to distract attention away from his messy divorce because nobody would deliberately put forward such a crazy scheme!
Great article Daniel!
Edit Comment Cancel
Craig Dalrymple 7 months ago
I think I see a new nominee for "Most Controversial". You really started a discussion here Daniel.
Edit Comment Cancel
Leave a Comment
You must register to post a comment.