The F1 Times gambling contest between Ryan Wood (Editor) and Daniel Chalmers (Feature Editor) heads to the 8th round in Valencia for the European GP.
Both men have a budget of £5 to spend on a maximum of 3 different bets relating to the upcoming event. The deadline for these bets to be placed is before the start of the first Friday practise session.
At the end of the season the winner will be the person who has made the most profit, or made the lowest loss.
Here are the results from last time (Canada).
Ryan Wood
Bet 1 – Michael Schumacher to qualify on pole – £2.00 at 6/1
Bet 2 – Lewis Hamilton to win the race – £3.00 at 4/1 – Won
Daniel Chalmers
Bet 1 – Michael Schumacher to win the race – £2.00 at 14/1
Bet 2 – Kimi Raikkonen to win the race – £2.00 at 12/1
Bet 3 – Paul Di Resta to finish in the top 6 – £1.00 at 15/2
It was a week of mixed fortunes. For Daniel, his bets on Schumacher and Raikkonen never stood a chance of being successful after both drivers had issues in qualifying. This put them too far down the grid to realistically challenge for race victory. Although Di Resta was in the top six in the opeing laps, his afternoon went downhill after his first pit stop.
Ryan on the other hand had one of his strongest weekends of the year. His approach of putting more eggs into one basket paid off handsomely. Hamilton drove the perfect race which won £15.00, which put Ryan back into profit overall.
After seven races £35 pounds have been spent by both men. Ryan now has £9.75 worth of profit, whilst Daniel has £25.50 worth of losses. Therefore there is now a difference of £35.75 between the two gamblers.
Heading to Valencia and again it’s a case of not knowing exactly what to expect. This is despite everyone’s best efforts to make predictions which sound logical, but then don’t work out. That is F1 2012 for you. As in previous races, it could be anyone of five or six teams that win the race.
Valencia is like Monaco in that there are a lot of slow corners, which means that traction is very important. There are also three or four long full throttle sections, or in other words straights with kinks in them.
The last section of the track is actually quite impressive, and it might actually be considered one of the top sections in motorsport, if it wasn’t in Valencia.
Perhaps more decisively hot temperatures are predicted this weekend, which will mean boiling hot track temperatures. In terms of the tyres and who can get them to work in those conditions, it could prove critical.
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Ryan Wood |
Daniel Chalmers |
Why not join in? If you fancy a go, why not join PaddyPower – with loads of Formula 1 markets from fastest laps and one lap wonders to the number of retirements or top 6 finishers – you’ll easily find something to bet on. Join now and get a free £20 bet when you make your first £10 bet – and for ease of play, you can even use PayPal to make deposits.
Let’s see where our money is going this weekend.
Round 8 Europe
Ryan Wood
Michael Schumacher to qualify on the front-row – £1.00 at 5/1
He qualified on pole in Monaco which is probably the most similar track to Valencia on the calendar. In fact, Valencia has the slowest average corner speed and the good traction the Mercedes has should help in those slower, tight turns.
The Mercedes also has good speed and whilst Valencia has few long straights, it does have four high speed stretches which have slight kinks in them. This should suit the Mercedes DRS system on Saturday.
Michael Schumacher to finish on the podium – £2.00 at 4/1
See above for the reasons why I believe Schumacher will do well in Valencia. In addition, Pirelli’s Paul Hembery has tipped the German to win the race.
I don’t think he’ll go so far as standing on the top step on Sunday, but I reckon a podium place could very well be on the cards if my front-row prediction becomes a reality.
Lewis Hamilton to win the European GP – £2.00 at 11/4
He won in Canada last time out and he’ll be looking to do the same this weekend with extra motivation. I can’t imagine we’ll see eight winners in eight races, it seems unlikely – though I thought that about seven from seven and that happened – but the further we get in to the season the more likely we’ll start to see someone become a little more dominant, and my money is on Hamilton this year.
Daniel Chalmers
Sebastian Vettel to qualify on pole- £2.00 at 11/4
Vettel delivered a fantastic lap in Montreal to claim his second pole position of the year. Although he didn’t win the race you sense Red Bull are just starting to rediscover the kind of form they enjoyed last year.
Valencia also has some similarities to Montreal with slow corners, which Red Bull seems to cope very well with these days. The RB8 also looked impressive in the tight turns of Monaco
Valencia is also one of Vettel’s strongest tracks. He has won here for the past two years. According to Toro Rosso it was the circuit where he discovered how quick a driver he was.
Although strategy and the tyres will make it an open race, I expect Vettel and Red Bull’s raw pace to shine again come qualifying.
Kimi Raikkonen to win the race – £1.50 at 12/1
I have done this bet a few times this season. It surely has to happen at some point. Valencia is probably as good a chance Lotus may get. With the high number of slow corners I expect the good traction of the E20 to pay huge dividends here.
Chances are this is also going to be the hottest race we have had in a while. The trend has been for Lotus to perform at their best in hot conditions.
Lotus has also emerged as one of the best at tyre preservation, after Romain Grosjean brilliantly made his one stop strategy work in Canada.
Providing Raikkonen can get himself in the top five in qualifying, I believe he has the package to challenge for victory. Fingers crossed the heat can help the team deliver better pace over a single lap.
12/1 are great odds for a result that feel is very feasible. Even more so than the previous occasions I have done this bet.
Jenson Button to finish on the podium – £1.50 at 7/2
Looking back at the first seven races of the season, McLaren seem to have been the most consistently quick team, certainly in terms of raw pace anyway.
Hamilton has managed to extract some very strong pace from the car recently. If Button can solve the issues he has faced recently, then his chances of finishing on the podium are extremely good.
McLaren say they think they have got to the bottom of his troubles. I believe them and will put money on Jenson as a result.
With the heat expected this weekend I think it will be easier to switch the tyres on, and I think that could help Jenson. Or I could just be talking a load of rubbish but it will be interesting to find out.
