The ALMS Points System - Should it Change?

[Liz]

During the ALMS race at Road Atlanta we heard quite a lot about the pilots' dissatisfaction with the current point system, especially from Pirro, who went about all weekend with a petition and got most everyone to sign on. Essentially his point was that since many teams (such as his own) have established co-drivers, it is unfair to pit them against one another for the championship. He made a big point of sharing his win with Biela in spirit though he could not do it in truth.

The BMW pilots were split up for the final race to give JJ and Jorg a chance to win and of course Jorg did it - but at a cost, I am sure, of making the two cars less competitive by having to train a new team for one race.

And then you have the Corvette teams, whose respective crews hate each other and you will see Bill France in the Andy Pilgrim car before you will see Ron Fellows or Johnny O'Connell in it, championship or no.

Should the points system be changed to reflect the reality of co-drivers and the team nature of sports car driving? What do you think?

[KC]

I agree with Emmanuelle Pirro on this. The drivers are teams and should not be allowed to swap with one another midstream and should compete for overall honors as a team. Team owners like the current system because it lets them mix and match drivers for each event and lets a guy who crashed out get into another car to finish.

[Heeltoe6]

I agree, there's little sense, when a team of driver campaigns the car and wins, to award only one of the championship. Even while a cse can be made things like the faster lap, etc, do distinguish between the better driver in the team, fast lap are really about chance and traffic, etc,etc so it seems stupid to elevate one drive over another on that singular basis.

KC, I do not think teams are allowed to switch drivers onto another team if their car crashed out; this is why Fellows could not get in the other Vette. Drivers can only drive the car the team has assigned them to in lists given to ALMS a few days prior to the race.

[Speedworx]

The points sytem should change. Biela has given his all in the same car as Pirro and has nothing to show for it.

[Liz]

The rules say you have to drive the car you have qualified, and once the teams have qualified, they are not allowed to switch cars. But before that it is not prohibited.

And besides that, I expect Andy Pilgrim and Kelly Collins were well prepared to repel boarders if Fellows had come onto their side of the fence. There seems to be no love lost there.

[Danielsun]

Quite a contentious issue this one, isn't it?

I absolutely believe that the scoring system - which has never really been liked - must change. You can't honestly say that Pirro deserved the ALMS crown more than Biela, can you?

Or then what of Tom Kristensen, the fastest driver in the 2001 series? He wound up last among the Joest team in the points totals. Imagine if Le Mans itself was a Championship round. Could you really say the driver who sits in the car longer than the other two should receive more credit?

A lot of the bonus points depend on who is in the car at the quickest point of the race. And with the normal 2h45m races of the ALMS/ELMS one driver is obviously going to get more time in the race than the other.

I guess you could say I think the bosses should change it...