[pob]

Sportsbabble had a good debut season last year, finishing 6th out of 10 forums.

If you haven't played before, the points system may sound complicated, but it's not that difficult to play, just pick the top ten and pole for each race and have a wild guess at what the pole time will be.

Zdkf1 has finished moving to its new server; hopefully there won't be any teething problems but if any returning players have problems with logging in please tell me, zdkf1 aren't always great at helping quickly so it may be easier to start a new account if you do run into problems.

Here's my usual opening post spiel...


The season is about to start, so it's time for you to make your predictions for this year's interforum league!

There's not long until the first prediction deadline , if you are late joining, don't worry, you will get some points for each race you missed (usually 20), and you can still help the forum in the league.

How to play:

• Register on zdkf1and start your nickname with “babble_”. (If you forget, please edit your nickname here.)
  
• Add the other entrants whose nicknames start with "babble_” as your friends.
  
• Predict the pole position, pole time and top 10 finishers for each race.
  
• The prediction deadline is 10pm (GMT) on the Thursday before each race (except Monaco).
  
• How the scoring works on zdkf1 (although the risk factor boundaries are outdated on that link; the categories actually are: very safe ≤19, safe 20-22, moderate 23-25; risky 26-28; crazy 29+).

In addition to helping the forum fight against other f1 forums for the (poorly photoshopped) league trophy, you will be competing for individual awards including:

individual champion (most points on zdkf1);
6 tenths award (for most league points scored);
quali trophy (for best pole time predictor);
and the much-coveted bernie medal (for most victories).


If one of your selected drivers doesn't race, then his replacement will be used instead with the same driver class.

Driver classes aren't up for Australia yet, but will presumably be added soon.

Slightly late predictions can be emailed to support@zdkf1.com and will be included at zdkf1's discretion but if you post them on here too I will at least include them towards the league.

Good luck everyone!

[Stairs]

If you played last year your current ID and Password seems to be valid :-)

[pob]

Yep, looks like the server change went with no hiccups.
Just 5 hours before the first deadline. Australia is always a difficult one to predict. Will anyone challenge Mercedes? Will Haas surprise with points in their first race? 

[St Charles Owl]

I'm in again, looking to defend my Sportsbabble title!!

[Amelia Chaffinch]

I predicted last night. Hoping to remember this time. Hopefully won't be moving house again so no distractions .... fingers crossed!

[pob]

Good to have you all on team sportsbabble.

There's been a one-off extension to the prediction deadline for Australia, so there's still time to signup if you are thinking of playing

[pob]

Australia Results

First of all I'd like to give a warm welcome to new entrants thefastlane and forumula1 . With grandprix not taking part this year  (their forum is down and their members have abandoned ship) that makes the number of forums in the league the same as the number of f1 teams.
There were 42 predictions across the 11 forums for this race. If you made a prediction but don't see your name in the top 10 or "also rans" please tell me!
Sardaor takes victory for 2013 champions cliptheapex, with 48 points thanks to 4 spot on and only Grosjean missing from the top 10.
Sportsbabble didn't place in the top 10 this race , but keep trying!

Code:

Pos nickname     forum     zdkf1 points  league points
1  sardaor       cliptheapex    48            25
2  kai-star      thefastlane    45            18
3  yurrita       f1technical    42            15
4  tranquilchaos ja606          42            12
5  redfrog       f1world        41            10
6  pdk           f1world        41             8
7  vfc_cipher    f1technical    41             6
8  titch         cliptheapex    39             4
9  king_arry     ja606          39             2
10 dreggsf1      f1onboard      37             1

scores for also rans from sportsbabble:
32 amelia
30 sco
29 stairs



League Table
Cliptheapex lead the league after the opening round, 8 points ahead of f1technical:

Pos_Forum__________Points
1___cliptheapex______29
2___f1technical______21
3___thefastlane______18
4___f1world__________18
5___ja606____________14
6___f1onboard_________1
7___not606____________0
=___sportsbabble______0
=___garagistasf1______0
=___v2________________0
=___forumula1_________0


Quali trophy
The pace was much faster than many of us expected, only four players scored towards the quali trophy this race, 1 point apiece for: sniffit from f1technical; sco  from sportsbabble; kai-star from thefastlane; and racecub from cliptheapex.

---

Race recap:
After a farcical qualifying session where F1's new qualifying format proved to be abysmal, the race was surprisingly good. Bad starts by the Mercedes drivers meant the Ferraris of Vettel and Raikkonen led for the opening stint, chased by Rosberg with Hamilton struggling further down the order. The race was halted after this huge crash by Alonso in the McLaren with the Haas of Gutierrez, Alonso was lucky to walk away from it with only minor injuries:

thanks to Reddit user BottasWMR for the excellent gif

The Mercedes drivers went onto the Medium tyre, thought to be the worst of the three tyre types available but the only tyre that would last the remainder of the race. This proved to be decisive, as the Mediums performed much better than expected. Vettel stayed on used supersofts, and he lost the lead to Rosberg when pitting. Vettel looked at least likely to salvage second place, but his chase of Hamilton ended with a mistake at the penultimate corner, leaving him to settle for third place. Raikkonen retired with engine trouble.

Further down the order the big story was Grosjean taking a great sixth place for Haas in their first race. It was down to some good luck, effectively doing a 0-stop race thanks to being able to change his tyres when the race was redflagged, but he defended his position brilliantly.
Toro Rosso were very quick, but only managed 9th and 10th in the end, with Verstappen taking his frustration out on his team over the radio.
Ricciardo lucked into fourth place for Red Bull, while his teammate Kvyat didn't start.
Williams were anonymous, 5th for Massa and 8th for Bottas.
Force India only managed 7th for Hulkenburg and 13th for Perez, although the red flag affected them badly.
Renault (who tookover the Lotus team at the end of last year) were battling for the lower points, with Palmer 11th after failing to hold off the Toro Rossos and Magnussen placed 12th.

[pob]

12 hours to get your predictions in for Bahrain.

There is a rumour that Alonso might not race because of his big crash in Australia, if he is replaced then 2015 GP2 champion Stoffel Vandoorne will probably replace him and he will get the same "driver class" as Alonso for scoring purposes on zdkf1.

[pob]

Bahrain Results

Welcome back to motorsportforums   , who are returning after a year out after placing seventh in 2014. This takes the number of forums in the league to twelve, so whichever forum takes the wooden spoon this year will be Caterham on the end of season photo.
Bahrain is a historic race for underdogs f1onboard, as dreggsf1 gets their maiden victory in their third season of taking part.
2013 champions cliptheapex have a 3 point lead in the league over rookies thefastlane.
Amelia scores sportsbabble's first points of the season with sixth place   .
As always, if you made a prediction but don't see your name in the top 10 or list of also rans, please tell me.

Code:

Pos nickname       forum   zdkf1 points  forum points
1  dreggsf1        f1onboard    54           25
2  wehateowls      garagistasf1 50           18
3  alcig           v2           49           15
4  kai-star        thefastlane  49           12
5  manutddaredevil ja606        49           10
6  amelia          sportsbabble 49            8
7  vfc_cipher      f1technical  46            6
8  cider_and_toast cliptheapex  42            4
9  chelseamf       ja606        42            2
10 sgtbhaji        not606       41            1

Scores for also rans from sportsbabble:

Code:

sco 28
stairs 27

League Table
Pos_Forum__________Points
1___cliptheapex______33
2___thefastlane______30
3___f1technical______27
4___f1onboard________26
5___ja606____________26
6___garagistasf1_____18
7___f1world__________18
8___v2_______________15
9___sportsbabble______8
10__not606____________1
11__forumula1_________0
=___motorsportforums__0


Quali trophy
Well done to forumula1's sagi58 for the best pole time guess on zdkf1, getting 3 points and the lead for the trulli trophy. Ten other players got within 1% to earn 1 point including sco   .

[pob]

Race recap
F1's new qualifying format was kept for another race, despite everyone agreeing that it was terrible. Hopefully it will be ditched for China, but it looks like Bernie and the FIA are refusing to go back to the old system.
Alonso missed the race due to a fractured rib from his accident in Australia. He was replaced by last year's GP2 champion Stoffel Vandoorne, who acquitted himself well, outqualifying his experienced teammate Jenson Button and taking McLarens only points of the season so far in tenth place.
Rosberg won for the fifth race in a row, capitalising well on the misfortune of others.
Vettel's Ferrari engine blew up on the formation lap.
Hamilton had a bad start from pole for the second race in a row, and then collided with the Williams of Bottas at turn 1. The stewards blamed Bottas for the incident, which was perhaps a bit harsh, and he was given a drive through penalty. Hamilton then had another good recovery drive to take third place in his damaged car.
Raikkonen recovered from a poor start to take second place in the other Ferrari, but although he kept Rosberg in sight, he never looked quite fast enough to challenge for the win.
Ricciardo took a good fourth for Redbull, with his teammate Kvyat in seventh hampered by running an alternate strategy and Verstappen was sixth for their junior team Toro Rosso. Sainz retired with accident damage caused on the opening lap.
Grosjean had another outstanding race for new team Haas, going one better than Australia with fifth place.
The Williams drivers of Massa and Bottas were eighth and ninth respectively, both having difficult races.
Magnussen had a good race for Renault to eleventh after starting from the pitlane. His teammate Palmer retired with hydraulics problems.
Force India had a bad race, both drivers suffering damage on the opening laps and resulting in a disappointing 15th for Hulkenburg and 16th for Perez.
Wehrlein had a great race for underdogs Manor, taking 13th splitting the two Saubers.