The F1 Times gambling contest between Ryan Wood (Editor) and Daniel Chalmers (Feature Editor) heads to the 16th round at Yeongam for the Korean 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.
Ryan Wood
Bet 1 – Pastor Maldonado to qualify on pole – £2.00 at 33/1
Bet 2 – Lewis Hamilton to win the Japanese GP – £3.00 at 2/1
Daniel Chalmers
Bet 1 – Kimi Raikkonen to win the Japanese GP – £2.00 at 9/1
Bet 2 – Sergio Perez to finish on the podium – £2.00 at 6/1
Bet 3 – Kamui Kobayashi to finish on the podium – £1.00 at 12/1 – Won £13.00
It was Daniel that came on top this week, whilst Ryan suffered a bit of a blip in contrast to his recent high standards. It all went wrong for him in qualifying as yellow flags ruined Hamilton’s decisive lap. Also it turned out not to be one of those days, where Maldonado found some incredible pace from nowhere.
Daniel was right that Sauber were going to be quick around Suzuka. Unfortunately Perez threw his podium chances away when trying to pass Hamilton for the second time. However Kamui had his best weekend of the season, and managed to hold off Button to win Daniel £13.00.
After fifteen races £75.00 has been spent by both men. Ryan now has £53.74 worth of profit, whilst Daniel has £28.40 worth of losses. Therefore there is a difference of £82.14 between the two gamblers.
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Ryan Wood |
Daniel Chalmers |
We now go to Korea and another of F1’s modern circuits. So far in its three year life it hasn’t received that much love from fans or F1 people alike. This is partly down to low crowd numbers, and the location of the facility. Many also dislike the track layout. It also had a tough baptism in its first year too.
However contrary to popular belief, the race track itself is actually quite interesting. It has a bit of everything. The first sector is just straights and is all about power just like Monza.
The second sector features high speed and long corners. So you could say there is a similarity with tracks like Suzuka and Silverstone there.
The third section has a street circuit feel to it with slow corners, and the barriers are quite close to the track.
Therefore setting the car up for this race is rather interesting. Which sector of the track do teams lean their setup towards? Or do they try and find a compromise so that the car works reasonably well in every sector?
It should be a circuit that brings out of the best of all the cars in at least one section on the track. For example Mercedes will be very quick in sector one, but will probably fare less well in the middle sector.
For that reason it could actually be quite an open event compared to the one sided affair we witnessed in Suzuka.
Hopefully all of Red Bull’s rivals will have a clean race weekend (unlike in Suzuka), so that we see a competitive race.
Round 16 Korea
Ryan Wood
Bet 1 – Mark Webber to qualify on pole position – £2.00 at 11/2
I think Red Bull will have a strong weekend, considering their blistering pace in Japan last weekend. Vettel is a sure bet for pole with the bookies at 2/1, so there’s very little money to be made betting on the German. I’ve opted to go with his team-mate who has equal machinery, therefore a pretty equal chance at pole… but with fairly decent odds.
Bet 2 – Lewis Hamilton to win the Korean GP – £3.00 at 3/1
Once again, Vettel is a sure bet for the win according to the bookmakers, so I’ve not gone for the obvious choice, but rather the second most obvious choice.
McLaren didn’t have a strong weekend in Japan, but this wasn’t because of their car. Hamilton’s qualifying was ruined by yellow flags and a broken suspension part which hindered his pace. Jenson Button meanwhile qualified a decent third, but was demoted to eighth following a gearbox penalty. McLaren have it all to play for in Korea, they just have to overcome Red Bull which certainly won’t be easy.
Daniel Chalmers
Bet 1 – Kimi Raikkonen to win the Korean GP – £3.00 at 14/1
Lotus has big upgrades on the car this weekend, which includes the Coanda exhaust as is a feature on the other leading cars. A similar update might not have made much of a difference to Mercedes, but it could have a greater effect on a car that is already quick like the E20.
Therefore I am taking the gamble that the update will catapult Lotus back amongst the leading contenders. It’s always worth taking a shot on a team, when they bring a huge upgrade to a race.
As they all say, if you back a horse enough times then eventually it will win. One of my Kimi bets has to come good one day.
Bets 2 and 3 – Romain Grosjean to qualify on pole – 50p each way at 33/1 and Grosjean to finish on the podium £1.00 at 11/2
I am also putting some money on the other Lotus too. Grosjean has taken loads of stick in the past week. However once he gets that crash helmet on I think he will be ok and remind people of the incredible talent he has.
Romain has been strong in qualifying all year. With an updated E20 I think he is capable of getting himself right into the mix. He qualified in the top five in Suzuka. Therefore I see no reason why he can’t get into the top three here in Korea, if he puts one of his great laps together.
We know that Lotus’ pace is better in race trim than qualifying trim. If Grosjean can survive lap one then there is no doubt he can fight for the podium. In the races where he has made a clean start he has gone on to race well.
