I have no idea who is going to win next season!

[rjbetty]

I know it's not as simple as that but for some reason success always follows Newey. Even at Leyton House in 1990 after they had sacked him.

I always found that odd. Why on earth DID they sack him? I always assumed he just left for Williams. Those Leyton House cars were amazing really, scoring podiums and almost winning the 1990 French GP with Ivan Capelli.

[DexDexter]

I always found that odd. Why on earth DID they sack him? I always assumed he just left for Williams. Those Leyton House cars were amazing really, scoring podiums and almost winning the 1990 French GP with Ivan Capelli.

They sacked him cause the car seemed to be a total failure in the beginning. They had just misinterpreted Newey's drawings.

[rjbetty]

They sacked him cause the car seemed to be a total failure in the beginning. They had just misinterpreted Newey's drawings.

Thanks. Wow what an incredibly foolish decision! Even back then they should have known better, surely.

[jens]

So in short - Vettel vs Alonso vs Kimi

Based on Oz looks like this guess may not be too far-fetched. In any case an interesting start to the season, which throws various possible scenarios into the air.

I do feel though that for Räikkönen to effectively participate in the title fight he and Lotus really need a great run in the beginning of the season, much like its predecessor Renault had in 2005-06. Lotus has got a very good team headed by technical director James Allison, but due to lesser funding or something else I suspect they are again going to lack the edge that Ferrari and Red Bull have in the development race. So capitalizing on current form and getting multiple wins early in the season is absolutely paramount.

[rjbetty]

I'm bumping this up from the pre-season to see how things turned out in comparison.

Wow keyzersoze well done, you called Hamilton and Mercedes perfectly!!

[jens]

1. Vettel (RBR) - 332
2. Alonso (Ferrari) - 294
3. Button (McLaren) - 246
4. Webber (RBR) - 198
5. Pérez (McLaren) - 157
6. Massa (Ferrari) - 136
7. Räikkönen (Lotus) - 119
8. Hamilton (Mercedes) - 102
9. Grosjean (Lotus) - 96
10. Rosberg (Mercedes) - 90
11. Hülkenberg (Sauber) - 72
12. Ricciardo (STR) - 38
13. Maldonado (Williams) - 31
14. Di Resta (Force India) - 30
15. Bottas (Williams) - 23
16. Gutiérrez (Sauber) - 20
17. Vergne (STR) - 18
18. Bianchi (Force India) - 17
19. Petrov (Caterham) - 1
20. Pic (Caterham) - 0
21. Glock (Marussia) - 0
22. Chilton (Marussia) - 0

Despite inadequacy in several ways, maybe one of my best preditions ever since I got first and second position in WDC standings right. Which is not always an easy thing to do.

Vettel dominated more than that, Alonso could keep up with him less than that. However, the advantage of both drivers above their team-mates (Webber and Massa) turned out to be roughly the case.

McLaren of course was much weaker, but from relative point of view Button did roughly have the kind of advantage over Pérez. Well, if we try to take a % of points from team-mate battles.

Mercedes and Lotus were stronger, maybe largely due to the incompetence of McLaren, but also Ferrari. The lead drivers of both teams scored slightly below 200 instead of slightly above 100. Rosberg was close to Hamilton. I overestimated Grosjean a bit compared to Räikkönen though he came good later on.

Hülkenberg wasn't far from this score and his second half of the season roughly reflected of what I was expecting. Sauber started out very slow though and had more financial issues than I thought. Gutiérrez didn't get even that though.

Force India was a positive surprise early in the season, so they got more points than that. Sutil instead of Bianchi, but points wouldn't have changed too much.

Ricciardo was a bit of a relevation of the season and was subsequently snapped up by Red Bull. He didn't get a podium though (like I predicted ) and had less points than that.

Williams was the disappointment, roughly on their 2011 level. In reality Bottas outscored Maldonado, but since they got only very few scoring chances, it didn't tell too much.

And we still haven't got a chaotic race to enable a Marussia or Caterham scoring a point.

Maybe will try to predict 2014 too despite a lot of unknowns! I like the exercise of it, attempting to understand F1 and its general processes more. However, I am still unsure, how could McLaren's such a bad season be predicted. There weren't really any proper markers beforehand to pinpoint to the shocker of a car they were going to produce.