A F1 driver thread to rule them all

[TwanV]

Hi everyone,

I thought this would be interesting for the F1Technical-community.
I stumbled on a cool website that allows comparison of driver scores normalised to point system:

http://formula1.markwessel.com/

The database is still being updated so this offers a nice perspective on the all-time scorers.
A further comparison can be made on normalised metrics:

http://formula1.markwessel.com/analysis/average-points

Wonderful statistics, apparently Fangio and Ascari had a entry/win ratio of 2:1
And surprisingly, for me at least, Hamilton and Vettel are up there in the top 10 no matter which statistical basis is used.

Enjoy and credit to the author

[Marvinn8686]

This is great, thanks!

[Just_a_fan]

Interesting site. Found one anomaly already whilst comparing Alonso and Hamilton. Reckons Alonso beat Hamilton in 2007. Which is wrong, of course, as Hamilton was 2nd in the Championship, Alonso was 3rd.

Might play around a bit more and see what other subjective outcomes he has on his "factual" site.

[TwanV]

Interesting site. Found one anomaly already whilst comparing Alonso and Hamilton. Reckons Alonso beat Hamilton in 2007. Which is wrong, of course, as Hamilton was 2nd in the Championship, Alonso was 3rd.

Might play around a bit more and see what other subjective outcomes he has on his "factual" site.

Did you select the correct PSS? it's fine for me. Apparently ALO would've beat HAM in 2007 if the 2010-2017 point scoring system had been effective at that time.

[Tommy Cookers]

does Mr Wessel know that F1 and WDC weren't synonymous ?
does Mr Wessel know that 1952 and 1953 WDCs were in F2 cars ?
maybe he does know that for some years the Indy 500 also counted for the WDC

perhaps there could be normalisation for the number of WDC races per year ? - once as few as 5 or 6

and maybe normalisation for race rules
(one driver was disqualified from a GP win as his car was underweight after the lap of honour but not underweight at the chequered flag)

[Just_a_fan]

Interesting site. Found one anomaly already whilst comparing Alonso and Hamilton. Reckons Alonso beat Hamilton in 2007. Which is wrong, of course, as Hamilton was 2nd in the Championship, Alonso was 3rd.

Might play around a bit more and see what other subjective outcomes he has on his "factual" site.

Did you select the correct PSS? it's fine for me. Apparently ALO would've beat HAM in 2007 if the 2010-2017 point scoring system had been effective at that time.

In the scoring system in place at the time, Hamilton beat Alonso. Saying "if you use a later system the result would have been different" is a bogus analysis.

Using normalising systems across decades is ok: it's impossible to know how drivers from different eras would have done otherwise. But when comparing two drivers in the same year, it's inaccurate (to be polite).

Another example of his inaccuracies: in 2016 Rosberg won the title. If you apply the 1990 rules (best 11 results count), Hamilton would have won. According to his site, Rosberg still wins.

The site does not appear to apply the scoring rules for each era correctly and thus the whole thing is a waste of time.

[TwanV]

Except that it isn't, you just need to be precise. I find this site to be great since the official record books are inconsistent as there is no normalisation. Points and number of race-wins/poles are useless for record keeping IMO as the scoring system and number of venues changed over the years. In fact it's position that matters, ideally normalised to the amount of events per championship.

[Just_a_fan]

If you apply a given set of scoring rules to a season, the outcome must follow those rules. His site doesn't do that. Compare Rosberg and Hamilton. Use the 1961-1990 rules. Rosberg wins. That's just plain wrong as the rules allowed for various discounting of bad results. Rosberg will win in any system that takes every race in to account. In any discounting system Hamilton wins.

If the site makes such a simple mistake, we can not trust it.

[TwanV]

If you apply a given set of scoring rules to a season, the outcome must follow those rules. His site doesn't do that. Compare Rosberg and Hamilton. Use the 1961-1990 rules. Rosberg wins. That's just plain wrong as the rules allowed for various discounting of bad results. Rosberg will win in any system that takes every race in to account. In any discounting system Hamilton wins.

If the site makes such a simple mistake, we can not trust it.

Well, then don't use it.

But to be honest I don't see the issue you're pointing out being relevant outside the boundaries of yourself trying to prove your point.. Are you saying you don't like the outcome? And besides, in statistics, there is no such thing as "trust". You either understand it or not. Except if the data would be "fake" but I don't see anything amiss with the database.

[TAG]

it's way too subjective to compare drivers of different eras. IMO so much more than simply stats go into making a driver profile, sure they should be a part of the equation, but not all.

[Just_a_fan]

But to be honest I don't see the issue you're pointing out being relevant outside the boundaries of yourself trying to prove your point.. Are you saying you don't like the outcome? And besides, in statistics, there is no such thing as "trust". You either understand it or not. Except if the data would be "fake" but I don't see anything amiss with the database.

The site is intended to allow comparison of drivers over the life time of F1 by selecting different scoring rules. Sadly, it doesn't apply those rules correctly. This isn't subjective - it's not about "trust" or "fake". The rules are set in stone. They are facts. If you apply a given set of rules to a driver comparison, there is one correct outcome. That's it.

The reason I started to look at the detailed outcomes is simple. I was surprised to see certain drivers low down whilst the likes of Hamilton and Vettel were so high. So I wondered if the system took account of the differing score rules other than the numbers per place. It appears that it doesn't do so correctly.

Trying to compare Fangio, Clark, Lauda, Senna, Schumacher, Hamilton is pointless. It can't be done in any meaningful way. Why? Because no comparison can take account of the issues of each era. You can't compare Fangio's 1957 'Ring win with anything done by Senna, Schumacher, Hamilton/Vettel/Alonso, for example. All of them great drivers in their respective eras but beyond real comparison other than that. Drivers can only be compared to their peers (hence my grouping of the current champs there). That's why people use phrases such as "best of his generation" when describing a stand out driver. Anything else is impossible.

[TwanV]

I agree that there are many factors, often subjective, to why some racing drivers stand out more than others. I apologize by the way for my reaction being a bit harsh. Nevertheless, I don't like the way the current point system/record keeping is applied to the record books, as it is a comparison between apples and pears. This find tried to sort that out and I have to say the scored points/race outcome answers pretty well to what I "feel". There is no denying that these statistics that describe Fangio's career (or Clark's/Stewart's for that matter ) are very impressive and these numbers do them more justice than the numbers you'll find on Wikipedia You're right that a fair comparison would include more metrics as technical dnf's are not so commonplace now as they were in the past for example. Still, a very good effort to make some sense of it all imo.

[3jawchuck]

F1metrics does a much better and more rigorous job of trying to statistically analyse the merits and relative performance of F1 drivers. Unfortunately his method is much more long winded and complicated than just swapping and changing points systems.

If you've not done so, check him out: https://f1metrics.wordpress.com/

[TwanV]

Great stuff 3jawchuck, I wasn't aware of that one, thanks.

[NL_Fer]

When looking at points, does it take superior cars in comparisation or other drivers? Look at 2002 Schumacher took all the points as a nr1 driver in an superior car. 2007/9/10 3 or more drivers are fighting for points in somewhat equal cars, they share the available points and none of them look really special.