Re: JPM to McLaren for 05

In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
 David Betts <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> Championships are there to increase the interest for the
> non-enthusiast or passing fan. They have phoney points systems
> designed to keep interest alive until they end of the season. They are
> certainly not about who is the best driver. In fact, they are not even
> about who has driven best that season. They are a construct. Often,
> they interfere with the purity of the individual races because someone
> ends up driving for points rather than the win. At best, they are a
> necessary evil.

 I'll agree that the points system is a construct designed to provide 
some continuity between races. However, I don't see that as a bad thing. 
Fans of a sport will *always* try to come up with a way to compare their 
favorite participants. If the sanctioning body doesn't, the fans will 
create their own.

> All GPs are important, yes. Each is the annual championship of that
> country and deserves to be taken seriously.

 I disagree that GPs are national championships. How many Australian 
races does Mark Webber drive in? Which Schumacher is the German national 
champion?

> They are not all equal,
> however. Modern GPs are sprint races on (mostly) sanitised circuits
> and will never be as meaningful for that reason. Some, however, do at
> least have a history. Going back a few years, there were plenty of
> races which were just as important as GPs....and some even more so -
> The Mille Miglia; the Targa Florio; the Tourist Trophy for instance.
> Sports car racing was still on a par with F1 into the '70s. The likes
> of Siffert and Rodriguez have claims to fame far above their F1
> achievements.

 I'll agree that modern F1 circuits are too similar. There's Monza, 
Monaco, and all the rest are variations on the same theme. But let's not 
forget why many of the old circuits and races are no more - they were 
dangerous, often deadly. How do we bring diversity in without losing 
safety?

[snip]

> All I'm
> trying to do is to put it into some sort of perspective. There are
> actually people out there who believe Michael Schumacher is the
> greatest driver ever because he won more championships than anybody
> else. In fact, he's not even the greatest driver because of the number
> of races he has won. There has to be a qualitative as well as a
> quantitative element.

 Hmmm. Something like the system used to judge gymnastics? A "perfect" 
drive is worth a 10, with deductions for each mistake? It might work, 
but it would be *very* hard to judge.

-- 
  Joe Claffey                   | "Make no small plans."
  [EMAIL PROTECTED]                  |        -- Daniel Burnham