multi21

There's a lot of changes coming my friends. From the sound of this article, this is going to happen.

Ecclestone to replace points for medals?
18 November 2008


Formula 1 could see even more changes next season as Formula 1 boss Bernie Ecclestone has said the FIA is considering to introduce medals in F1. Ecclestone confirmed that he is seriously considering dropping the points-based drivers' championship for a medal-based title race, which should make it more exciting.

In case the FIA would introduce a medal-system in Formula 1 the winning driver will receive a gold medal, with a silver and bronze medal for second and third instead. So instead of receiving 10, 8 and 6 points the podium finishers will go home with a nice and shiny medal. Anyone not finishing on the podium would not receive any points but their finishing position will remain important for their overall ranking. The constructors' championship would remain unchanged and will still be based on a points system.

The medal-system could be introduced as early as next season. "The FIA and all the teams are behind it and it will be done," Ecclestone was quoted by British newspaper The Times. "Everybody understands gold medals and silver and bronze. Nearly all sports are done that way. The whole point will be, when they get to Melbourne for the first race, the guys will want to leave there with a gold medal. They don't want to leave with ten, eight or six points.

"The need for it was highlighted at the Brazilian Grand Prix at the end of this season when Hamilton only had to finish in the top five to win the title, not win. So this will encourage overtaking."

Bryan Watts

Huh?

Gary R.

Children living in an Olympic village in Germany have been reported to have a higher prevalence of sensitization to common aeroallergens than another cohort living in the neighboring city of Zerbst; these differences correlated with the presence of industrial air pollution. Samples of fine particulate matter (< 2.5 micro m aerodynamic diameter; PM(2.5)) collected in Hettstedt in 1999 had several-fold higher levels of zinc, magnesium, lead, copper, and cadmium than samples from Zerbst. To determine if the results from epidemiologic studies could be repeated in an animal model, we administered PM(2.5) from Hettstedt and Zerbst to ovalbumin-allergic mice. In Balb/c mice, PM(2.5) from Hettstedt, but not PM(2.5) from Zerbst or control filter extract, caused a significant increase in immediate responses to ovalbumin challenge when aspirated 2 hr before challenge, but not when aspirated immediately before sensitization 2 weeks earlier. Antigen-specific IgE was increased by Hettstedt PM(2.5) whether administered before sensitization or challenge. Airway responsiveness to methacholine aerosol and lung inflammatory cell numbers were significantly increased only in allergic mice exposed to Hettstedt PM(2.5) before challenge. Both Hettstedt and Zerbst PM(2.5) significantly increased lung injury parameters and proinflammatory cytokines. These results are consistent with epidemiologic findings and show that metal composition of ambient PM(2.5) influences the severity of allergic respiratory disease.

Ari 997TT

Is it April 1st already?

ltc

Forget gold, silver and bronze, forget the podium, forget all this parc ferme stuff

Just copy NA$CAR.
One winner, wreckers or checkers, one victory lane.

That ought to add some excitement.

schwank

Huh?

M758

"If you ain't first, you're last!"

Scootin159

While it's not being labeled as such, this is still a point system. It just gives a LOT more points to the winner than 2nd and so forth.

i.e. we could translate this to the current points system as roughly a logarithmic scale of points distribution:

1st: n^8
2nd: n^7
3rd: n^6
4th: n^5
5th: n^4
6th: n^3
7th: n^2
8th: n

with n = # of races per year

.... I do like this idea though, as it means 1st is worth MANY more points than 2nd (it would be ~11 billion points for 1st vs ~600 million for 2nd in 2008).

ltc

Max and Bernie are one step away from turning F1 into the motorsport equivalent of Dancing With The Stars combined with Gladiator.

At the end of every Grand Prix, viewers from around the world call in (for a nominal fee of course, paid to FOM) and vote a driver 'off the F1 island'.

At the end of the season, there then would be only 2 drivers left and at the end of the race, Bernie walks up into Caesar's Box, dressed in his ceremonial Toga (Max of course will be wearing nothing but his boxers and will be escorted by his **** themed hookers) and gives a final, season ending 'Thumbs UP or Thumbs DOWN' to the lucky driver.

The crowd then goes wild and tears down the entire motorsports complex, thus providing work yet again for Herman Tilke.

Sounds reasonable, right?

fast_freddy

Can we vote Bernie off the F1 Island?

multi21

Lewis, I know your joking, but really, the rules are never stable and it's always one thing or another in F1, sometimes they'll change a rule in the middle of the season.

For competitive balance they change rules to not have a dominate team (ie the Ferrari/Schumacher era), but this season was the best ever with 3 top teams and Renault coming on strong to make up a 4th.

Imagine, what next year would have looked like had the rules stayed the same. You would have had Ferrari, McLaren, BMW and Renault all pretty equal. But now, it's a crap shoot, all for the PC BS of "Green racing" and of course "cost cutting". All these changes of course cost money....

ltc

I know.
I'll still watch it next season only because it's still F1.
Of course, if I can figure out a way to watch DTM and WRC races that would be even better.

Then again, I am grateful for F1 in its current form......it did create Sir A.Wayne

gums

What's wrong with these guys?
They don't just leave with points, there are also trophies, in case anyone wasn't watching.

TheOtherEric

Ok, so do you get both a medal AND a trophy on the podium? Huh?

Like Scott said, it's still a points system.

multi21

This happened in Nascar when Matt Kenseth won the title a few years back and didn't win a race all year. Nascar then changed the point system so that couldn't happen again.

This sounds much the same. If this system would have been in place, Ferrari still would have won the Constructors Championship this year, but Hamilton would not have, but rather Massa with 2 more wins. Who it really would have hurt was Robert Kubica who was a consistent point scorer all year, but only had 1 win and would have been out of the title hunt much earlier than he was.