Round of Australia '08 - Picks and comments

schmorbraten · Post by **schmorbraten** » Sun Mar 09, 2008 12:32 am

When this year's 8'n'pole first opened to submitting picks, I put down these on 19.02.2008:

Winner : Kimi Raikkonen
Second : Lewis Hamilton
Third : Felipe Massa
Fourth : Fernando Alonso
Fifth : Heikki Kovalainen
Sixth : Nico Rosberg
Seventh : Nick Heidfeld
Eighth : Robert Kubica

Pole : Kimi Raikkonen

- but now I've changed the order slightly and submitted the following:

Winner : Kimi Raikkonen (hard not to choose him)
Second : Lewis Hamilton (could just as well be massa here)
Third : Felipe Massa (could just as well be hamilton here, both with a shot at winning)
Fourth : Heikki Kovalainen (i wouldn't put fisi in a mclaren on this position, but i don't think heikki falters in great cars like fisi does)
Fifth : Nico Rosberg (i rate him highly and williams seems to have got a good bit closer)
Sixth : Fernando Alonso (no winning car, but a winner behind the wheel. )
Seventh : Robert Kubica (nick's quick, but kubica is sometimes quica

)
Eighth : Nick Heidfeld (may change that to coulthard or nakajima)

Pole : Kimi Raikkonen (may change that to massa)

- but I think Toyota, Red Bull and Toro Rosso could also score points first time out.

Jim Watt · Post by **Jim Watt** » Sun Mar 09, 2008 9:19 am

Greetings Chaps!

I can't believe it's only another week to go!!

And here are my picks for the first round:

Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari (just like last year, only better and faster)

Lewis Hamilton McLaren (seeing Ferrari and Raising-- and beating the fast Felipe, but not able to catch the Finn!)

Mark Webber RedBullRacing Ferrari (because Mark is at home and Mark is a hungry man in a fast car! [actually, I expect him to qualify in the top five]):lol:
4th Place: Heikki Kovalainin McLaren (by year's end I should be able to spell his name --along with a lot of others!)

5th Place: Fast Felipe Massa (he always has a hard time getting going; I expect him to lose heart when Lewis gets past him and he can't catch him even with the excellent work of the Ferrari pit crew)8)
6th Place: The Two Time, back-to-back World Driving Champion, Fernando Alonso in a Renault (and I expect he'll be carrying the car on his back) will be wondering why he believed Flavio B.

7th Place: Quick Nick in the BMW/Sauber will be wondering how that Renault and RBR Ferrari got around him so easily

8th Place: Robert Kubica in the sister BMW/Sauber will try to pass Quick Nick in the closing laps, but JUST NOT make it!:alright:
And the Pole

will, of course, go to the fun-loving Fast Finn, Kimi in his beautiful big red machine (get used to it. this year I think the Kimster will out-qualify Felipe BIG TIME!)

I can hardly wait. In fact, I'll probably get up in the middle of the damn night to watch the thing live!

Jim Watt

Now if I can just get Tony George to open American open-wheel racing up to any car that meets the posted specs! If he does and if we get the kind of racing we have seen in the IRL, and the kind of speeds and wheel to wheel action, look out Bernie E. --your product's value to racers may be slipping...

Mart2005 · Post by **Mart2005** » Sun Mar 09, 2008 9:37 am

Winner: Fernando Alonso

Second: Kimi Raikkonen

Third: Nelson Piquet Jr

Fourth: Lewis Hamilton

Fifth: Nick Heidfeld

Sixth: Kazuki Nakajima

Seventh: Felipe Massa

Eighth: Mark Webber

Pole: Kimi Raikkonen

schmorbraten · Post by **schmorbraten** » Sun Mar 09, 2008 8:37 pm

Jim Watt wrote: ...

Mark Webber RedBullRacing Ferrari (because Mark is at home and Mark is a hungry man in a fast car! [actually, I expect him to qualify in the top five]):lol:

...

7th Place: Quick Nick in the BMW/Sauber will be wondering how that Renault and RBR Ferrari got around him so easily

...

In the back of the Red Bull Racing cars there's no Ferrari engine, it's a Renault for the 2nd year now. RBR had a Ferrari engine in 2006, but for 2007 they wriggled out of that deal (Ferrari being reluctant to let a customer with a contract go on record by choosing anything else above the Ferrari engines) and transferred it to the sister cars, the STRs and opted for a Renault engine for themselves. Ferrari engines are currently to be found in the back of six cars on the grid: the Ferraris, the STRs and the Force India cars (just like when they were still called Spykers).

Bundy · Post by **Bundy** » Mon Mar 10, 2008 12:53 pm

I've awoken from my post/pre season slumber & am looking forward to a new year.

Winner: Kimi Raikkonen
Second: Lewis Hamilton
Third: Felipe Massa
Fourth: Mark Webber
Fifth: Fernando Alonso
Sixth: Nico Rosberg
Seventh: Nick Heidfeld
Eighth: Giancarlo Fisichella

Pole: Kimi Raikkonen

Jim Watt · Post by **Jim Watt** » Tue Mar 11, 2008 9:40 am

Schmorbraten wrote:

In the back of the Red Bull Racing cars there's no Ferrari engine, it's a Renault for the 2nd year now. RBR had a Ferrari engine in 2006, but for 2007 they wriggled out of that deal (Ferrari being reluctant to let a customer with a contract go on record by choosing anything else above the Ferrari engines) and transferred it to the sister cars, the STRs and opted for a Renault engine for themselves. Ferrari engines are currently to be found in the back of six cars on the grid: the Ferraris, the STRs and the Force India cars (just like when they were still called Spykers).

Yoiks. You're right, of course. I just love RBR so much it's hard for me to accept that they're running those damned French motors.

There's no rhyme or reason to this; I am an utter Francophile; whenever I'm in Europe, I'm not happy till I'm back in Paris. But when it comes to racing, the blue cars are ALWAYS the enemy to me.

Jim Watt

gkaytaz · Post by **gkaytaz** » Sat Mar 15, 2008 7:34 pm

Hi folks.

Most of us seem to agree on the top three

After today's quali I am not so sure anymore though... Anyway, my picks were as follows:

Winner : Kimi Raikkonen
Second : Lewis Hamilton
Third : Felipe Massa

Fourth : Fernando Alonso
Fifth : Nick Heidfeld
Sixth : Heikki Kovalainen
Seventh : Robert Kubica
Eighth : Nico Rosberg

Pole : Kimi Raikkonen

Cheers...

Jim Watt · Post by **Jim Watt** » Sun Mar 16, 2008 4:24 am

I forgot how the anchor falls out of the sky on Kimi just when you think his luck has changed at last!

So. Going into the race my picks look almost PERFECTLY upside down!

I picked Kimi to win -- AND he'll have to come from 16th on the grid to do it
I picked Lewis to place --AND he'll probably do better since he starts FIRST
I picked Webber to show -- AND he'll have to come from 15th do do it
I picked Heikki to place 4th --AND he starts THIRD!
I picked Felipe to place 5th --AND he starts FOURTH
I picked Fernando to place 6th --AND he starts from 12th place!
I picked Quick Nick to place 7th --AND he starts from FIFTH
and
I picked the last point to go to Kubica --AND he starts from the outside of the FIRST ROW!

What a fabulous beginning for the season; it looks like it may be as exciting (ie unpredictable) as NASCAR!!

Hooray! I'm going to stay up and watch it live; I can't wait!

Jim Watt

8 n Pole Admin · Post by **8 n Pole Admin** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 10:35 pm

Yes the results have been late but not much more to go ....

In the meantime, here is how the competition players picked the top 3 places and pole:

Race Winner

Kimi Raikkonen 64.55%
Lewis Hamilton 19.82%
Felipe Massa 9.45%
Fernando Alonso 4.55%
Heikki Kovalainen 0.91%

Second place

Lewis Hamilton 33.09%
Felipe Massa 28.55%
Kimi Raikkonen 25.09%
Fernando Alonso 8.00%
Heikki Kovalainen 2.55%

Third place

Felipe Massa 35.27%
Lewis Hamilton 27.45%
Fernando Alonso 11.27%
Heikki Kovalainen 8.36%
Kimi Raikkonen 6.00%

Pole

Kimi Raikkonen 59.64%
Lewis Hamilton 20.55%
Felipe Massa 14.55%
Fernando Alonso 3.27%
Heikki Kovalainen 0.55%

8 n Pole Admin · Post by **8 n Pole Admin** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 1:28 am

Spatzi top scored in the first round of the 2008 season. Spatzi scored 38 points.
Given the high number of retirements, the average score for the round was relatively low at 21.67.

Congratulations to Spatzi, you have won a NewsOnF1 Compact Smart Digital Clock with Alarm.

Please give us your comments on how you've managed such a stunning pick!
All other players can contribute here as well. We'd love to hear from you.

The Overall Top 20 is available here

The Australian Top 200 is available here

The Popularity Picks for the round of Australia is available here

Results for individuals and groups are being sent via email.

Please note that due to a problem in the scoring system related to pciking Sebastien Bourdais, we have resent the results to all the players.
Apologies for the inconvenience.

Good luck in the next round of Bahrain. Deadline for submitting your picks is on the 4th of April at 10:00 AM Bahrain time (that is 7:00 AM GMT)!

JayVee · Post by **JayVee** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 8:52 am

Congrats to Spatzi

I managed 20 points which I thought wasn't too bad ....

Your Score for this round is 20 and your Rank for this round is 284 (Top score this round: 38)

Your Total score is 20 and your Overall Rank is 284 out of 2561

Need to work more on the strategy though!!

booklover · Post by **booklover** » Fri Mar 28, 2008 7:07 pm

nicely done i manged 13 and was last in my group it is seriously annoying