Welcome all to Week Forty-One. This is the last week with as many as four events. These include Formula One (Delhi), MotoGP (Australia), WEC (Shanghai) and NASCAR (Martinsville). Please pick ten drivers/riders/sports-cars up to a maximum of seven in any one event in a comment on this post before 6 AM BST Friday 26th October (1 AM ET) (essentially late Thursday night).
Drewe’s Performance Charts
Do visit Drewe’s fine charts and tables to see such as the Full Year Difference Chart and Form Guide, which Drewe is updating every week.
Click to open Performance Charts in new window.
Scores
Results – Top Tens
| MotoGP | ALMS | DTM | WRC | NASCAR | |||||
| Sepang | Road America | Hockenheim | Sardinia | Kansas | |||||
| 1 | Pedrosa | #12 Rebellion | Spengler | Hirvonen | Kenseth | ||||
| 2 | Lorenzo | #95 Level 5 | Paffett | Novikov | Truex | ||||
| 3 | Stoner | #055 Level 5 | Farfus | Tänak | Menard | ||||
| 4 | Hayden | #46 Thiriet | Green | Østberg | Kahne | ||||
| 5 | Rossi | #0 DeltaWing | Werner | Ogier | Stewart | ||||
| 6 | Bautista | #06 Core | Mortara | Atkinson | Bowyer | ||||
| 7 | Barbera | #35 OAK | Priaulx | Mikkelson | Smith | ||||
| 8 | Espargaro | #9 RSR | Hand | Prokop | Keselowski | ||||
| 9 | Ellison | #52 PR1 | Schumacher | Solberg | Johnson | ||||
| 10 | Abraham | #05 CORE | Vietoris | Pedersoli | Gordon |
It was a wet race for MotoGP in Malaysia, which saw the now familiar theme of Lorenzo taking the lead only for Pedrosa to over-take him later in the race to pull away for the win. The track had been drying but more rain caused a red flag at about three-quarters distance, with Lorenzo in imminent danger of losing second to Stoner. A few riders fell off when conditions worsened, including Dovizioso who did manage to remount (13th), and Crutchlow (16th).
At the Petit Le Mans, Rebellion took both pole and victory. The #16 Dyson suffered repeated electrical and fuel issues (31st). The #6 Muscle Milk Pickett was keeping up with Rebellion, but after contact with the Green Hornet Porsche needed to halt for lengthy repairs (33rd). The #37 Conquest had finished fourth, but was excluded post-race for one of their drivers exceeding the maximum drive time (dsq).
At the DTM finale, Spengler had qualified third and passed Paffett who made a weak start. Fellow BMW driver, Farfus, let the Canadian past for the lead on lap one. Paffett managed to squeeze by Farfus in the pit-lane at the first stops, and the Brit chased down Spengler but could get no closer than 1·1 seconds. Spengler’s race win gave him the title. Rockenfeller retired after two laps with contact damage (21st).
Hirvonen won an eventful Sardinia Rally. Loeb hit a rock and broke a steering arm on stage three, due to a puncture just before that corner on the recce leading to an incorrect pace note, and chose not to use Rally Two rules to rejoin (rtd). Instead of taking advantage of Loeb’s misfortune, the Ford drivers both decided to crash as well, Latvala on stage four and Solberg on stage seven, with both resuming on Saturday, Latvala ending up 12th. Østberg lost minutes on Friday with rear-differential failure reducing his car to front-wheel-drive only.
Kenseth won in a fairly wild Sprint Cup race at Kansas, despite side-slamming the fence earlier in the race and needing his crew to pull his fenders back out. Johnson suffered even more damage when on lap 137 his car swapped ends and rear-ended the outer wall. The team repaired the car best they could during repeated stops behind the safety-car to avoid losing a lap, with the #48 recovering to top-ten.
Player Scores
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You might want to try full-screen (F11), or click here to open table-image in a new window. |
Non-entries get 176 according to the 90% rule.
Lots of congratulations to Drewe for a strong win in a difficult week, being the only player to select four winners. Well done also to RubberGoat, with his decision to avoid the vagaries of WRC paying off.
Commiserations to Speedgeek, who in the three years of this game has won a reasonable share of weeks but has had more bad luck than anyone, most especially this week. When checking the official result on Sunday and I spotted on top of everything else the #37 had been excluded, I felt terrible for Andy. If he purchased a lottery ticket, it would probably explode.
With so many good choices having bad weeks, in retrospect MotoGP and DTM were the strongest options, and even NASCAR looked relatively predictable. It is the first time in many weeks we have had a wide spread of scores, with it being the third time this year the spread has been more than one-hundred.
Leaderboard
| Pos | Pre | +/- | Name | Prior | Wk 40 | Total | Differences | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | Sebastian | 10680 | 302 | 10982 | 0 | - | |
| 2 | 2 | iomracer | 10518 | 281 | 10799 | 183 | 183 | |
| 3 | 4 | +1 | RubberGoat | 10486 | 308 | 10794 | 188 | 5 |
| 4 | 3 | -1 | Maverick | 10508 | 253 | 10761 | 221 | 33 |
| 5 | 6 | +1 | Chris W. | 10380 | 299 | 10679 | 303 | 82 |
| 6 | 5 | -1 | Pat W. | 10391 | 240 | 10631 | 351 | 48 |
| 7 | 7 | Drewe | 10210 | 340 | 10550 | 432 | 81 | |
| 8 | 8 | The Speedgeek | 10126 | 196 | 10322 | 660 | 228 | |
| 9 | 9 | Jackie | 9477 | 176 | 9653 | 1329 | 669 | |
| 10 | 10 | Matt | 9048 | 176 | 9224 | 1658 | 429 | |
| 11 | 11 | Ryan | 8552 | 176 | 8728 | 2254 | 496 | |
| 12 | 12 | Jay | 8338 | 176 | 8514 | 2468 | 214 | |
| 13 | 13 | James | 8269 | 176 | 8445 | 2537 | 69 | |
| 14 | 14 | New players | 8250 | 176 | 8426 | 2556 | 19 | |
RubberGoat takes second-place off iomracer, but only by a scant five points, and they both need to look out for Maverick. Chris moves into fifth-place at Patrick’s expense, but that battle may be far from over.
This Week
Roster
· Formula 1 – Delhi, India
· MotoGP – Phillip Island, Australia
· WEC – Shanghai, China
· NASCAR – Martinsville, USA
The deadline is 6 AM BST Friday 26th October (1 AM ET). Also remember the countdown widget rounds up on days.
Pick ten drivers/riders/sports-cars up to a maximum of seven in any one event.
The points system is
50-40-35-32-30-28-26-24-22-20-19-18-17-16-15-14-13-12-11-10-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-2-2-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1.
Click to open guide/links to this week’s events in new window.
Not that I expect anyone was planning to pick him, but Ben Spies is out with an injury.
Comment by Sebastian X — October 22, 2012 @ 7:37 pm
· Formula 1 – Delhi, India
Sebastian Vettel
Mark Webber
Fernando Alonso
· MotoGP – Phillip Island, Australia
Dani Pedrosa
Jorge Lorenzo
Casey Stoner
· WEC – Shanghai, China
#1 Audi
#2 Audi
#7 Toyota
· NASCAR – Martinsville, USA
Denny Hamlin
Comment by Mav — October 22, 2012 @ 11:20 pm
Wow – a win. After watching Crutchlow have a terrible start in the MotoGP, I felt like I was lost. Then he gained positions which was good. Then he parted ways with his bike at high speed, and I was sure I was out of it! Seems it was a hard week for many….
F1
Vettel
Webber
Hamilton
Button
MotoGP
Stoner (home track, last race, most of the country is going to be there. And I work for a large Motorcycle franchise (based out of a Honda store, with Casey posters and videos on every wall), so If I choose otherwise I will be shot!)
Lorenzo
Pedrosa
WEC
#7 Toyota (they can do it again, yes they can)
#1 Audi
#2 Audi
NASCAR
Martinsville – make that bumpsville! Great track to watch….. But I’m not going to risk it this week!
Comment by Drewe — October 23, 2012 @ 3:39 am
Well done Drewe. I got lucky – I suppose it’s karma for the bad luck Grosjean gave me in Japan GP week?
F1:
1) Vettel
2) Webber
3) Hamilton
4) Alonso
MotoGP
5) Stoner (I agree – he got 3rd in a race he didn’t even want to start!)
6) Lorenzo
7) Pedrosa (win or bin)
WEC
8) #7 Toyota
9) #1 Audi
10) #2 Audi
Getting my picks in early as I’m away for the weekend – will have to try and watch the F1 and MotoGP when I get back
Comment by rubbergoat — October 23, 2012 @ 6:58 am
I was going to pick Webber, but he blows it too often. Very close call between Johnson and Hamlin.
Formula One:
Fernando Alonso
Sebastian Vettel
Kimi Räikkönen
MotoGP:
Jorge Lorenzo
Dani Pedrosa
Casey Stoner
WEC:
#1 Audi(Lotterer/Tréluyer)
#2 Audi(Kristensen/McNish)
#7 Toyota(Wurz/Lapierre)
NASCAR:
Jimmie Johnson
Comment by Sebastian X — October 24, 2012 @ 6:05 pm
F1:
1) Sebastian Vettel
2) Fernando Alonso
I was tempted to add Button, but think F1 is too volatile compared to …
MotoGP:
3) Dani Pedrosa
4) Jorge Lorenzo
5) Casey Stoner
6) Andrea Dovizioso
… and …
WEC:
7) #7 Toyota (Wurz/Lapierre)
8) #1 Audi (Fassler/Lotterer/Treluyer)
9) #2 Audi (McNish/Kristensen)
10) #12 Rebellion (Prost/Jani)
Comment by iomracer — October 24, 2012 @ 10:19 pm
It seems Perez is ill and may not race.
Comment by Sebastian X — October 25, 2012 @ 4:51 pm
Ok… one down, coming for you Maverick with:
F1:
Vettel
Alonso
Raikkonen
WEC:
#1 Audi
#2 Audi
#7 Toyota
MotoGP:
Pedrosa
Lorenzo
Stoner
NASCAR:
Keselowski
Comment by Chris W — October 25, 2012 @ 6:10 pm
Ouch. Well done Drewe, 100 points more than me.. that closes the leaderboard up. I can’t believe Andy’s bad luck this year.
F1 New Delhi
Vettel
Webber
Alonso
- Red Bull Central and the McLarens are nowhere at the moment
MotoGP Phillip Island
Pedrosa
Lorenzo
Dovizioso
- Despite this pick it should be a fairly unpredictable race even by this year’s relatively boring standards.
WEC
#1 Audi
#2 Audi
#7 Toyota
#21 Strakka
- That HPD is fast and so is Danny Watts.
Comment by Pat W — October 25, 2012 @ 9:15 pm
I will say that a chunk of my “bad luck” is self-inflicted, in that I have a tendency to take a couple of fliers early on in the season, those don’t work out, I drop behind and then I finish out the season taking 5-6 fliers every week in a vain attempt to close the gap to the player(s…definitely plural) in front of me. On the other hand, stuff like me being the only person who picks the Conquest car…who then finish 3rd…which then gets DSQ’d…that I can not explain. On to this week.
F1:
Vettel
Webber
Button
Hamilton
MotoGP:
Stoner
Dovizioso
Pedrosa
WEC:
#7 Toyota
#2 Audi
#12 Rebellion
Comment by The Speedgeek — October 26, 2012 @ 3:52 am
I should keep my mouth shut…. But with an hour to go before picks close, Stoner has topped P1 for the MotoGP by almost a second. He may bin it yet, but crazy
Comment by Drewe — October 26, 2012 @ 4:56 am