New points system!

Nickv Wrote:
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> No no no no. 2/10 is the same as 5/25. It. Won't.
> Matter.

Button's fallen for the same trap: "It's a great idea," Button told BBC Radio 5 Live. "It's nice that you get five points over second for winning. That's important because we all love winning races. I won six races this year and I got just two more points." [en.espnf1.com]


I'm very disappointed that this has gone through. Firstly because it looks like the uneven increments around 7th and 8th wasn't a typo, and secondly because if they wanted to change the points, why not just use the 15-12-10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1 method as suggested above...

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X (@ed24f1)

According to Autosport (who love doing this sort of thing), the most recent championship that would have been altered with this system would be 1999, giving Eddie the title. That said, he would have had it anyway under the outgoing system...

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Using history as the argument that it is 'devaluing past records' is bollocks. As many here will know by now, I'm a traditional in most areas, but there's no continuity in the points throughout F1 history.

In the 50s drivers used to hand over their cars to the guy who had a better chance at the title (in one instance, ending his own chance).
Up until the 90s you had dropped scores (the amount of which was often shifting from season to season).
We went from 9 points for a win to 10 points.
We moved from 6 points scorers to 8 points scorers.

Saying that such a change devalues the achievements of the Fangios, Clarks, Sennas and Schumachers is completely worthless, as among them there hasn't even been any continuity in the points system anyway - the points system was different in the eras all 4 of those examples drove.

On top of that, the season has a lot more races than it used to, so more points can be scored.

Got to say it does seem a little strange to read at first, I mean 25 points in one go?!!

Will probably take a few races to get used to but im sure its a change for the good. Then again, it certainly devalues when a team says we're aiming for points. However with possibly 3 new teams and 2 more possibly under new ownership (Sauber and Renault) it will be an interesting year.

I hate saying this because at some point most people will, but next season is already looking like it will be great! There is a genuine chance that Mclaren, Ferrari, RedBull and Mercedes will have winning cars, on top of that I was kinda expecting BMW to be a hot runner next year.

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"Trulli was slowing down like he wanted to have a picnic" LOL

It's absolutely shocking how bad some people are at simple maths... I just read reactions on a German website and many people didn't realise that with 25-20-15-10-8-6-5-3-2-1, places 8-10 will have increased worth, places 4-6 will have decreased worth while all other places have the same worth as before... Someone even stated that now a no-score would hurt more as losing 25 points compared to 10 would be so much worse - but don't think he understood when someone else told him that it will still be the same because you could still make up the gap with just one win...

Sorry for this outburst - but I just had to post it somewhere. What do they teach in schools nowadays?

Driver A (good driver, good car) wins 3 races and finishes 3rd in the other.
Driver B (good driver, mediocre car) finishes 4th twice and 5th twice.

Driver A would score 36 points under the old system and 90 points under the new system (increased by a ratio of 2.5)
Driver B would score 18 points under the old system and 36 points under the new system (increased by a ratio of 2.0)

Thus it rewards those who finish higher, like many of us have been clamouring for, but is a bit of a kick in the teeth for teams like Williams, who will fall proportionally further behind. It'll open up the gap between the top teams and the midfield, which IMHO is a bad thing.

I really can't believe that 8-6-5-3-2-1 though. That's exceptionally poor! I'd have though 8-6-4-3-2-1 would have made much more sense.

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gav Wrote:
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> Using history as the argument that it is
> 'devaluing past records' is bollocks. As many here
> will know by now, I'm a traditional in most areas,
> but there's no continuity in the points throughout
> F1 history.

I have to completely disagree there.
There's actually been plenty of continuity in the points system from 1950 up to now - it hasn't stayed exactly the same, no, but it's always stayed very similar from one era to the next, and the system has evolved nicely. 8-6-4-3-2 for the top 5 in the 50s, the addition of the point for 6th in 1960, then the winner being awarded 9 points from 1961 onwards and then the system staying completely unchanged until 1991(if that's not continuity, frankly I'd like to know what is). Then the minimal change of increasing the number of points for a win to 10, after which it stayed unchanged till the change in 2003 to the last one. Every change so far has been small and evolutionary; the number of points awarded for each top 5 position hasn't changed by more than 2 so far in F1's entire history. To suddenly go from that to a 150% increase in the number of points for said positions is a massive jump.

So I stand by my original argument - since the scoring systems throughout history have all been pretty similar(in terms of the actual number of points scored) and this one will be radically different, it will have the effect of devaluing the achievements of previous greats - at least in terms of the number of points scored - if it's used for many seasons. Imagine Hamilton coming good and having a season like, say, Schumacher had in 2002 or 2004. We'd have n00bs saying things like "Lewis is greater than Clark and Fangio! He scored more points this season than they scored in their careers, LOLOLOLO!" and other similar BS. I cringe at the mere anticipation of things like that. (As said above, there should really be a pre-2010 division and a 2010-onwards division in the history books for points scored, if they're going to do this.)
So no, it isn't a worthless thing to say, and it isn't bollocks any more than the "no continuity in the points" argument is.

What I'm saying is - increase the number of points-paying positions, yes, and increase the number of points for the higher positions accordingly. If the time for some more changes has come, then I have no problem with that. But make those changes sensible and logical ones which continue the evolutionary process above, not OTT ones.

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Is greatness really measured or even defined by points? I mean the first things that come to mind about Senna are his 65 pole positions or his number of Monaco victories, not how many points he scored in the races.

Also, i wonder how a "point" is defined in the current performance-based contracts

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/11/2009 10:57PM by tripleM.

Imagine Hamilton coming good and having a season like, say, Schumacher had in 2002 or 2004. We'd have n00bs saying things like "Lewis is greater than Clark and Fangio! He scored more points this season than they scored in their careers, LOLOLOLO!" and other similar BS. I cringe at the mere anticipation of things like that.

So, in fact, that's your only concern. It's not that you think that past achievements will devaluate, it's that you fear that idiots will think that and therefore it shouldn't be implemented. IMO that's very strange reasoning and should never be a reason not to implement something that can improve F1. People can be very stupid, but really not THAT stupid. People don't say some NASCAR driver is better than Schumacher because the NASCAR driver scored 500 points in a season. Even those people you are aiming at would understand that it's a different point system.

Also the fact that something has had a longtime continuity doesn't mean it can't be changed. I hated it when the euro came, but I got used to it and it's quite handy when you go on a holiday for example. Yes, the good old guilder isn't there anymore and yes, the euro hasn't got the same connection to the Netherlands as the guilder, but if that's the only downside of it, oh well... You can't keep things the same just for the sake of continuity. Things change, contexts change, so everything in that context has to change with it to keep stuff working.

Nickv Wrote:
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> It's not that you think that past achievements will
> devaluate, it's that you fear that idiots will
> think that and therefore it shouldn't be
> implemented.

At no point did I say the new points system shouldn't be implemented. I said the increase in points should be toned down. I said this in my first post on the previous page.


> IMO that's very strange reasoning and
> should never be a reason not to implement
> something that can improve F1.

My concern is that in years to come, people who've only known F1 since the new points system came in, and who regard stats as gospel without thinking deeper, will see the current drivers as being automatically better because of the greater number of points they've scored. I used the "idiots" as an extreme example of this. My bad if I came across as a bit harsh and aggressive, and apologies to yourself and Gav.


> Also the fact that something has had a longtime
> continuity doesn't mean it can't be changed.

Like I said above, and in the final part of my last post before this, I have no problem with changing the points system per se. It's the degree of change that I'm talking about.

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Quote
EC83
the addition of the point for 6th in 1960, then the winner being awarded 9 points from 1961 onwards and then the system staying completely unchanged until 1991(if that's not continuity, frankly I'd like to know what is).

Number of points finishes which contributed to the drivers world championship:

1960: 6
1961: 5
1963: 6
1966: 5
1967: 9
1968: 10
1969: 9
1970: 11
1971: 9
1972: 10
1973: 13
1975: 12
1976: 14
1979: 8
1980: 10
1981: every points finish counted
1985: 11
1986 onwards: every points finish counted

Ah, I was thinking of the scoring system for individual races... Apologies again dude, for misreading what your post was actually talking about and talking @#$%& in response. You were, of course, spot on.
Guess I'm pwned here :P

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Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 12/12/2009 05:04AM by EC83.

this is a bad thing imo, were the points not good how they were this year and the last few?

The championship has been decided right at the very end in the past few years, somehow i doubt this trend will continue.

Nickv Wrote:
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> Which is the exact thing they wanted to achieve.
> They want to increase the chances of scoring
> points without changing the ratios. You should
> check the last places in the WCC instead, those
> are much more bound to change.

Exactly. This is no different to what we have now, but with more cars scoring. This is a GOOD thing, since reliability is to good now days that lower teams have almost no chance of scoring points. And points are worth millions (literally) in prizes.

You want more private teams, and less corporate whores like Honda and Toyota? You have to make it so they can at least grab a handful of points. That was possible before simply because of the terrible reliability. Now days with cars completing several races distances on a single engine, you have to take this into account in how the points are dished out, otherwise you are going to see the smaller teams dying off again.

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DaveEllis Wrote:
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> Exactly. This is no different to what we have now,
> but with more cars scoring. This is a GOOD thing,
> since reliability is to good now days that lower
> teams have almost no chance of scoring points. And
> points are worth millions (literally) in prizes.
>
> You want more private teams, and less corporate
> whores like Honda and Toyota? You have to make it
> so they can at least grab a handful of points.
> That was possible before simply because of the
> terrible reliability. Now days with cars
> completing several races distances on a single
> engine, you have to take this into account in how
> the points are dished out, otherwise you are going
> to see the smaller teams dying off again.


Agreed. I wanna see the new teams at least in with a chance of clawing their ways up the tables.

But my post shows you that new teams have LESS chance of "clawing their way up the tables" under the new system than under the old. I'm surprised no-one's mentioned it yet aside from me; the gap between the top teams and midfield teams will INCREASE under the new system because the ratio of increase in the midfield is lower than the ratio of increase at the top.

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Yep. The smaller teams will be able to score some points where they wouldn't have had the chance to previously, which will look good on their CV etc, but the teams which are consistently quickest will pull away a huge gap at the top of the standings, unless there's an uber-competitive season.

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gav Wrote:
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> > the addition of the point for 6th in 1960, then
> the winner being awarded 9 points from 1961
> onwards and then the system staying completely
> unchanged until 1991(if that's not continuity,
> frankly I'd like to know what is).
>
>
> Number of points finishes which contributed to the
> drivers world championship:
>
> 1960: 6
> 1961: 5
> 1963: 6
> 1966: 5
> 1967: 9
> 1968: 10
> 1969: 9
> 1970: 11
> 1971: 9
> 1972: 10
> 1973: 13
> 1975: 12
> 1976: 14
> 1979: 8
> 1980: 10
> 1981: every points finish counted
> 1985: 11
> 1986 onwards: every points finish counted

the 1985 system was used in 1987 and 1988 seasons, and it was changed for 1989 with every points counting because in 1988 Ayrton Senna became world champion with less points than Prost, but with better 11 results - Ayrton had 8 wins and 3 second places, Alain had 7 wins and 7 second places, so Ayrton became world champion with 90 points (he scored 94 in the total of races) and Prost was 2nd with 87 (he scored... 105 points!)-.





Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/12/2009 06:09PM by Frantic.

Locke Cole Schreef:
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> But my post shows you that new teams have LESS
> chance of "clawing their way up the tables" under
> the new system than under the old. I'm surprised
> no-one's mentioned it yet aside from me; the gap
> between the top teams and midfield teams will
> INCREASE under the new system because the ratio of
> increase in the midfield is lower than the ratio
> of increase at the top.


As Jackal pointed out, the value of points only drops for the places 4-6. And those places generally aren't occupied by the midfield or a mediocre car, but by the top teams (except for 6th place maybe). Midfield teams will have the places 7 and lower, which have increase value. Unless top teams constantly only occupy p1 to p3, the total value of p 1-6 (the top team spots) has actually dropped because 1-3 stays the same and 4-6 decreases in value.

Also, you make it sound like the midfield teams stood a chance before and won't stand a chance at all next year, which isn't quite true. New points system or not, Williams and the likes would still not stand a chance against the big teams.