02/10/2024
FEATURE BY MAX NOBLE
The curious syncopated rhythm of the 2024 season is set to restart shortly in Austin.
Liberty Media will be twirling the conductor's baton in their own backyard, a historically great race surrounded by a fluctuating number of tasteless add-ons. Groucho Marks once quipped, "I never forget a face, but in your case I'll make an exception!" When it comes to some of the curious activities in Austin, and indeed Miami too, forgetting them is a wise approach. Las Vegas has only hosted the one race in the modern era. So let's see what they inflict on a nervous fan base this year before rushing to any extreme judgement.
The glitz, questionable fashion, and inexplicable activities are bound to continue. As are ever increasing ticket prices and breathless pronunciations of infinite awesomeness from Liberty. Makes one go misty eyed, daydreaming of the sporting simplicity of that legendary slow-motion run in Chariots of Fire, which was itself a dramatization of a story which was far less dramatic when it actually happened back in 1924.
Of the race to the 1924 Olympics as depicted by Chariots of Fire, Wikipedia has the following sage observation:
...the film was not intended to be historically accurate (Are they ever - Ed). Numerous liberties were taken with the actual historical chronology, the inclusion and exclusion of notable people, and the creation of fictional scenes for dramatic purpose, plot pacing and exposition.
Greg Maffei (Liberty CEO) and Stefano Domenicali (CEO of the Liberty owned Formula One Group) must both have this framed on their office walls, and gaze at it with loving eyes each day. How wonderful to directly manipulate for entertainment! Failing that, down-play the racing and add lashings of new entertainment! What endless money-making joy! Oh the racing? The real fans? Right...
How it will all end for Liberty Media and the F1 expansion into Northern America remains to play out. As the new generation that rushed to Drive to Survive during the pandemic go and chase the next shiny bouncing ball, who will be left watching F1? The beauty of time dear reader, is one need only wait, and the future unfolds itself before you. We shall discover in precisely ten years' time what F1 looks like in ten years. Just wait, and watch.
To an immediate sporting question! How will this season end?
Last season Singapore was the only race Red Bull failed to win. It fell to Sainz in the Ferrari. This left seven races to season's end. This year Singapore fell to Norris in the McLaren, and six of the same seven races remain. This year Japan was early in the season, having previously followed Singapore. The six remaining races are in a different order, but they are the same six.
We shortly have the US GP in Austin, followed by Mexico, then Brazil and then Las Vegas. Then Qatar before the season ending Abu Dhabi. Six races all won by V. Max last year.
In Singapore 2023, Max finished a distant 5th, off the podium, and over 20 seconds behind Sainz. This year he finished second, just over 20 seconds behind Norris. What a strange difference a year makes! Same time gap, very different result. Yet this year's Red Bull appears inferior to last years. Most curious. Singapore 2023, and V. Max already had 12 wins under his belt, including the previous ten in a row, setting a new record.
This year he has a 'mere' seven wins as of Singapore. Is he going to nearly double that number and win all six remaining GPs, or is Norris going to more than double his life-time number of wins by taking all six and forcing the championship to the wire?
Considering previous years one would favour V. Max without further concern. On the quality of his three wins you'd give serious weight to Lando. On this season so far in review... well one would have pause for an extended consideration. V. Max triple World Drivers' Champion, and an F1 career record of 61 wins from 203 starts. That gives him a win percentage of 30%. Last season it was 86%. Let's settle nicely in the middle for now, and expect V. Max to win 50% of the remaining races.
Lando has three wins from 122 starts, that's a career stat of 2.45%. Last season it was zero. This season all three of those wins came from 18 starts (as of Singapore). That's a win percentage of 16.7%. Compare this to V. Max's 'bad' season of seven wins from 18, being 38.9%. Oscar and Lewis are the only other drivers so far this season to have two victories. Being 2 from 18 for each of them, representing an 11.1% win rate.
To spare your poor scribe having to count on the Pitpass cat's paws I'll round a few of those numbers up and down to make the maths simpler.
Let's be positive for Lando, and round him up to a 20% chance of winning each remaining race. So we would predict he wins at least one of the remaining six. Oscar and Lewis have an 11.1% chance each. So let's say we have a 20% chance for one of them winning a remaining race.
V. Max has a career average of 30%, a 2023 season average of 86%, and an average this season of 38.9%. I'm torn between a 40% chance and a 50% chance each race. Last season he won every single one of these remaining GPs. Yet for the middle of this season his car has been nowhere. I'm going with 40%, but reserve my right to change that to 50% if V. Max runs away with it in Austin!
At 40% we'd expect V. Max to win 2.4 of the remaining races... so call it "two or three".
Retirements? One for V. Max at the Australian GP. None so far for Norris. So we'd have to say a Norris retirement is the more probable at this stage of the season, or possibly an engine penalty.
Both are excellent at avoiding crashes, so barring extreme bad luck, or an attack of the Schumacher red-mist in one of the final races, we can be fairly confident that both will finish all races in which they do not have a mechanical issue. Same with injuries. V. Max simply avoids them, while Norris cut his face at a party. No Jet skis, snow skis or mistake-skis on this front. So other than unforeseen medical emergencies - think appendix - probably no missed races due to injury.
Podiums...? 11 from 18 for V. Max, being 61.1%. 10 from 18 for Lando, being 55.6%. Ouch. In a sport like F1 whereby fractions of a second can mean the podium or nothing, a 5% advantage looks big.
Lastly, points. V. Max on 331 and Lando on 279. A 52 point shortfall. Ok. Let me put my Pitpass cat where my mouse is, and make a prediction (hello Mount Doom, and a forthcoming tsunami of "I told you so!" when it proves utterly incorrect...).
Six remaining races. V. Max wins 2. That's plus 50 points. Lando wins 2. That's 50 points. Result? No change to points gap.
Leclerc wins a race. V. Max and Norris are closed down a fraction.
Norris suffers a DNF or RET. Boom! V. Max now has an extra pile of points in his buffer.
Which all means V. Max can sit out the final race of the season and still be World Drivers' Champion as Norris can win, grab 25 points, and still be in the region of 50 points behind him.
V. Max has an F1 career average of being on the podium 53.7% of the time. That's on the podium at least every other race, often on the top step. If Norris is counting on lots of non-podium finishes from V. Max he is going to be a sad bunny. By comparison Norris has been on the podium for 19.7% of his F1 career. Yet another number backing V. Max.
Other permutations? Why there are many. We might get a first time winner. Norris and V. Max might take each other out dicing in a tight race. Lando might have a mechanical failure. Ferrari might string together two great race weekends, and both Leclerc and Sainz win again this season.
Yet all these other permutations favour V. Max. To be world champion Lando needs to win, and either have many cars between him and V. Max, which is improbable, or have V. Max DNF, which is also improbable.
How does it all end? Well I think for this year it will be V. Max for championship number four, with Lando an excellent second. At least that's what the numbers say. Yet we all know there are lies, damn lies and statistics. So what do numbers know? Bring out the humans! We have Greg and Stefano gazing with loving eyes at those words about artistic license in Chariots of Fire. Sprinklers? V. Max trips down steps getting out of the simulator? Lando parties so hard he misses a race weekend? Ferrari actually remembers how to race? V. Max is deducted championship points for being a potty-mouth? Then we have the human heart beating within each driver. Championship challenges are a "been there, done that" for V. Max while this is totally new territory for Lando. Under pressure who do we think is more likely to crack?
So how does it all end!? Dear reader! The beauty is I have no idea, and I cannot wait to find out! Now, should I read some tea leaves, or have the Pitpass cats draw names out of a hat... or should they draw cards, roll dice...? I know, cats on skateboards. That's got to be a great idea. I'll be outside on a slope should anyone need me. Assign each cat a driver's number, and let them roll!
Max Noble
Learn more about Max and check out his previous features, here