The F1 ‘Oracle’ – Trying to predict the results for GP #12: Belgium
In this series of posts I attempt to predict the top 10 of both the qualifying session and the race ahead of qualifying. I will enter these predictions on GuessTheGrid, a website which takes your top 10 predictions and ranks them against other’s.
Before I will present my prediction, let us take a look at how my prediction for the Hungarian Grand Prix worked out.
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Hungarian GP Recap
This Hungarian Grand Prix was a decent result for me points-wise, but others achieved better results meaning that I didn’t make any progress at all. The gap of 31 points to the then leader Pamphlet widened extremely to 46 points. It seems I am totally out of contention for the top spot now, or multiple miracles need to happen. Even if I get both qualifying and race exactly right, I will only be able to close the gap over one race. Still, I rose from 25th to 24th on the leaderboard, but in context this slight rise is meaningless.
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Belgium Prediction
Lets move on to predicting the results for this Grand Prix. The results of FP1, FP2 and FP 3 you can view below:
Looking over the results, it seems to be another close race between the Ferrari’s and Mercedes cars. The deciding factor could be who has the better exit at La Source hairpin which decides the end result.
Qualifying
While Ferrari is on top in FP3 with both cars ahead of their rival’s, Mercedes traditionally have a bit more reserves built into their pace during Free Practice. Surprisingly, Raikkonen has been faster than Vettel all weekend. I think this trend continues for qualifying. I don’t know whether they are able to see off Hamilton in a bid for pole position. Verstappen seems to have his teammate beat, while behind the top 6 it seems like another toss-up between Renault, Force India, Toro Rosso and Alonso’s McLaren.
Race
If Ferrari are able to put themselves between the Mercedes cars on the grid or at the exit of turn 1, they have an excellent chance of getting the top spot on the podium through strategy. Ferrari is, however, famous for its terrible strategic choices so I wouldn’t put it past them to botch their strategic calls. Whatever the case, Ferrari will make sure Vettel finishes ahead of Raikkonen. I’m afraid Red Bull still don’t have the horse power to contend for a podium here, unless something happens (looking at you, weather gods).
This makes my prediction as seen below:
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Discussion
What do you guys think? Does your prediction align with this one, or do you have a radically different opinion? Let me know, either in a comment, or on reddit.com/r/formula1!
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This is the prediction for my alternative account (FelixDicitDotCom) on GuessTheGrid. On the website, you are able to predict right up until the start of qualifying and the race. I suggest you use the information gained from FP3 to change your prediction for the Qualifying session. And, you can use Qualifying to adapt your prediction for the race. This is a strategy I will employ on my main account (FelixR1991). Some might think this is cheating. Ultimately, it does not matter – since I have no knowledge ahead of the session about the result. Spreading my options between the accounts won’t work for the grand tally, as I won’t know which is the better prediction.
Previous posts in this series:
- Melbourne, Australia (36 points)
- Shanghai, China (44 points)
- Sakhir, Bahrain (34 points)
- Sochi, Russia (42 points)
- Barcelona, Spain (29 points)
- Monte Carlo, Monaco (25 points)
- Montreal, Canada (39 points)
- Baku, Azerbaijan (21 points)
- Spielberg, Austria (34 points)
- Silverstone, Great Britain (39 points)
- Hungaroring, Hungary (37 points)
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