For several races, the 2024 drivers’ championship fight appeared to be heading for an unexpectedly close conclusion, as Lando Norris whittled away Max Verstappen’s championship lead.
But Norris starts today’s race well outside the points-paying positions and the winner of the previous round, Charles Leclerc, is best placed to trim Verstappen’s healthy points lead.
Clearly both drivers have only outside chances of preventing a fourth consecutive championship win by Verstappen. But just how realistic are their hopes? The situation isn’t quite as clear as it used to be, due to changes in the championship points system in recent years.
As recently as 2018, drivers only scored points based on their finishing positions in the grand prix. If a driver won a race, they could expect to take at least seven points off their rival.
That changed when the bonus point for fastest lap was introduced. Now each driver could pick up an extra point if they set the fastest lap – but only if they finished in the top 10.
The introduction of sprint races added further complexity to F1’s points system. Now drivers can score up to an extra eight points each weekend, but only at certain rounds of the championship.
Finally, in the wake of the infamous 2021 Belgian Grand Prix, F1 introduced three alternative points systems to be used in the event of shortened races. Although these haven’t been used in F1 yet, they have been seen in junior championships, such as today’s F1 race.
To stay on top of all the possible outcomes of this year’s championship, RaceFans has created a new version of its F1 Championship Calculator. As well as adding the results for any upcoming races, you can alter the results of past races to see how the championship might have turned out. Find it here:
Please make any suggestions for improvements to the Points Calculator in the comments below. Among the planned updates for future versions are revisions to formatting and layout for devices with smaller screens.
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2024 Azerbaijan Grand Prix
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