Last year I did a funny "prediction thread" where I multiplied the points from the last race by the number of remaining races and added that to the current points totals. The original idea was to ridicule the old saying that the pilot is only as good as the last race, a saying that for most of us is ironical to start with, but in the heat of the season we tend to forget... Anyway, the thread got interesting when the end of the season came about and I decided to refine the formulas a little bit (thanks for the input forum user apoka).
This year I'm including the 03 pre-season tests as well, in order to get to posting sooner. Also I'm basing this on an Excel template and a graphical format to speed it up for me. So this years formula is: (points so far) + (points from the last 03 events divided by three) * (number of remaining races) = (end of season prediction).
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Here is the WCC graph stating that Ferrari is the predicted champion after pre-season and after Australia. It's also showing 2nd place going to Merc and 3rd to Lotus. Merc is going upwards because its results are better when we disregard Jerez and include Australia. The opposite is true for Lotus.
For the WDC graph I decided to clean most of the drivers away, just leaving some more of the more interesting pilots in (the selection can change as the season proceeds):
To further explain what we are looking at here at the WDC graph I'll take Fernando as an example: He did real good during the pre-season, so he is right up there to start with. He did good in Australia as well and as the the non-appearance from Jerez test is cleaned out as well, he is now doing even better. So he is my top pick for the 2013 Champ after Australia!!!
As was last year, my numbers will have errors in them and my explanations may be lacking at times. So just ask for comments and justifications when there is something that does not seem to add up!
EDIT: Fixed the images to a smaller size.
Edited by turssi, 17 March 2013 - 20:50.