2009 In Review - Driver Consistency

[rubbergoat]

Hey guys,

So far, in evaluating driver performances in 2009, on my F1 Stats blog ‘Making Up The Numbers’ we have looked at Finishing Positions, Qualifying Performance and Fastest Laps. Now we have finally arrived at the last category – Driver Consistency. I shall summarise the post here and you can click the link if you want to read more…

This is a subject which is particularly interesting to me, because I have been analysing this for most of the year. If you are new to this blog, why not catch up on some of these posts by clicking here? Also, if you need reminding on how these figures are calculated, please click here. Please note that no allowances have been made for differences between teams here and if you want a closer look at the charts, you can click on them for a larger version

What I aim to do in this post is to present a series of charts. The first two will split the field based on average rankings for 2009. These are calculated by calculating a ranking for each driver based on his average lap time, summing all the races they competed in 2009 and then taking an average ranking. So let’s have a look then:






It is definitely not true that the fastest driver is the most consistent here! But a few points of note first – I have included drivers who did not run a complete season, which will skew the results a bit as consistency is affected by changes in conditions. If a driver does not run a complete season they may not experience these effects and therefore may appear better than they are.

Having noted that, we cannot conclude that Kobayashi was the most consistent driver – however impressive his performances for the last two races were! However, we do have a surprise winner in Fisichella (for Force India), who did not have a great season.

Does the most consistent performance imply he drove well or just that the car was a safe and sturdy drive?

Kimi Raikkonen finishes high up but as he is supposed to be known for his consistency I thought he would have done better, personally.
Also, Barrichello beats Button by nearly half a place – probably due to Button’s mysterious dip in form mid season.

Heidfeld ranks quite far down the order, which is very surprising considering he finished something like 42 races on the trot. I thought that would mean he is quite a steady driver, but apparently not according to this. Well, he gets beaten by Piquet, so that cannot be a good thing!

It is interesting that pretty much all of the field average between 7th and tenth, which mean that most drivers must be remarkably consistent. It’s only when we get to the back of the grid that the curve starts to rise almost exponentially.

But what do these graphs really mean? Well, before I have a go at evaluating the driver’s total performance (that will be the next post), I thought this would be the last piece in the puzzle. I can already see how this could be a flawed way of evaluating a driver performance though – it takes no account of car performance, which as we have seen in races this year, can vary over the course of a race or even over a stint.

Indeed, I have noticed this fact when comparing drivers for certain posts I have written, such as this graph for a post about Badoer or this one for a post about Hamilton Vs. Barrichello. You can see on these graphs that even consistent drivers don’t hit their laps spot on every time, and there are so many different variables at work here that we cannot expect that.

I guess what we cannot see on this data is whether the driver was giving 100% or not. That is a place where the numbers simply cannot go. But it’s fun to speculate, so please do so in the comments…

P.S. – I plan to do a ranking of all the drivers based on a weighted scoring system – If you have any ideas on what percentages I should use, please leave a comment. The categories will be those used to review the drivers, which were:

1. Average Finishing Position
2. Qualifying Performance
3. Fastest Laps
4. Driver Consistency (This Post)

I thought of doing 50-25-5-20. Let me know what numbers you would use and I will try and include them


Cheers,


//Gavin Brown (RubberGoat)
http://f1numbers.wordpress.com/

[DaveKillens]

Hi rubbergoat, it's my pleasure to meet you in this fine forum. You have made an interesting presentation, and to be honest, I have to digest it for a few days.

It's a neat exercise in evaluating drivers, but my biggest concern is that the car's performance is huge, it is easily over 50% of the equation. And that's where it gets difficult. And even then, car performance can go up or down relative to the others because of upgrades. And as in the case of Brawn versus Red Bull, one car was stronger in cooler conditions, while the other was practically unbeatable when it got hot.

For me, personally, my only way of positively identifying dominant drivers is to compare teammates.

Good presentation though, worth watching.

[marcush.]

the graphs and work behind these is really outstanding and gives food for thought about preoccupations we develop over time -steady Heidfeld as a good example-
thanks for sharing ,your website is also avery good source for info ,many thanks for sharing!

[Belatti]

Gavin, first of all =D>

P.S. – I plan to do a ranking of all the drivers based on a weighted scoring system – If you have any ideas on what percentages I should use, please leave a comment. The categories will be those used to review the drivers, which were:

1. Average Finishing Position
2. Qualifying Performance
3. Fastest Laps
4. Driver Consistency (This Post)

I thought of doing 50-25-5-20. Let me know what numbers you would use and I will try and include them

Now, a ranking of drivers should reflex how good is a driver, without taking into account what does he drive. A very difficult thing to do!

Some thoughts...

- The category no.1 and heavier in percentage is highly dependant on the cars performance and reliability.
- The driver consistency, and I think you already stated it, can give you a wrong vision. For example, Piquet and Kovalainen are consistent, but way slower than their teammates.
- The fastest laps 5% is ok to me, as sometimes it can be misleading, specially when a driver that had been arround the 18th position all the race has some problem and goes to pits 5 laps before chekered flag, to finish with low fuel, fresh rubber and the 5th better lap.
- What about driving errors, like spins or collisions? Should there be points penalizations for them?

Maybe I would make the calculation adding a 5th category where a comparison is made against each drivers teammate, just to lighten category no.1 and put the driver into perspective with the cars potential.

Something like this:
1. Average Finishing Position - 30%
2. Qualifying Performance - 25%
3. Fastest Laps - 5%
4. Driver Consistency (This Post)- 20%
5. Intra team performance - 20%

Cat. 5 can be calculated like this:
- Qualy: 3 points if better than team mate.
- Fast lap: 1 point if better than team mate.
- Race position: 6 points if better than qualyfied team mate, for a DNF team mate take positions from a couple of laps before the DNF problem (becareful with pitstops).

I know that drivers like Alonso will go up in the ranking thanks to cat.5, as this may reflex not only that he is good, but that he had shitty team mates. But hey, listen! the world is not perfect!

[marcush.]

to value a driver compared to his teammate is not giving any hint about his overall value .
If your teammate is hopeless this will not in any ways prove anything ,same goes for the situation when you have to go head to head with the very best .You might be second best overall ,still you lost every battle to your teamate.So the intern battle is NOT telling anything and must be left out of the equation.

DNFs because of technical failures should not influence the result ,as should errors or happenings outside the influence of the driver.(sutil rammed by Raikonen ,
malfunctioning refueling rig ,offense in parc ferme rule...etc...).

Why not build an average race laptime breakdown for each race and gauge the driver consistency from there? this way around a piquet or Fisi are consistently mediocre wherea a quick driver would shine with plus consistency.

[Richard]

HI Gavin

Welcome to F1T. I've read your blog a few times, its good stuff. =D>

Its interesting to see how Massa comes out of this. Before his accident, he was streets ahead of Hamilton and Raikkonen on points, yet his consistency is very low. Hamilton also rates very badly, but that's no surprise when he gave the impression of sulking for many of the early races.

This just shows your point about strategy is very important. Perhaps the better driver is the one who can put in fast laps when it counts, on demand. For example at the start and before a pit stop? We saw Jenson do that to great effect with overtaking in the first few laps of a race, and also gaining places in the pit stop windows.

Yes, a consistent driver will get you reliable performance, but the winner is the one who takes risks. They have a little extra somehting in reserve that they use to boost performance.

Once again, welcome to F1T!

Richard

[marcush.]

HI Gavin

Welcome to F1T. I've read your blog a few times, its good stuff. =D>

Its interesting to see how Massa comes out of this. Before his accident, he was streets ahead of Hamilton and Raikkonen on points, yet his consistency is very low. Hamilton also rates very badly, but that's no surprise when he gave the impression of sulking for many of the early races.

This just shows your point about strategy is very important. Perhaps the better driver is the one who can put in fast laps when it counts, on demand. For example at the start and before a pit stop? We saw Jenson do that to great effect with overtaking in the first few laps of a race, and also gaining places in the pit stop windows.

Yes, a consistent driver will get you reliable performance, but the winner is the one who takes risks. They have a little extra somehting in reserve that they use to boost performance.

Once again, welcome to F1T!

Richard

=D> very good thoughts

This is one major point in the discussion about the value of having a competent test driver making it into the race team...it is just a different world -setting up the car is not developping a car ,driving constantly at good pace is not the equal of a outstanding performer ,let alone a grandprix winner and not a world champion.
You have to have access to some extra hidden power in that special moments ,rising to the occasion,something we have seen again and again from :
Hamilton ,Button ,Schumacher Michael...
and we have also seen them drop the ball when it did not really matter as well...

[nacho]

Interesting to see how Fisichella really was that much all over the place in a Ferrari compared to Force India. Maybe Force India overall was even a better car than it looked, easy to drive and fast.

Quite interesting that all the substitute drivers look horrible unconsistant except Kobayashi. There is something weird about Kobayashi's performance, too much above expectations.

[Mr Alcatraz]

Just off the top of my head, in a straight comparison within a team, Rubens was very consistant.
Consistantly a little slower than Button!