[Official] Abu Dhabi Grand Prix - Predictions Contest 2022 - Final Round - Results

[Born Racer]

Congratulations to our new world champion, BTCC frog.

He wins the coveted Ten Tenths prize of a mug, telling anyone in his office or at home who will listen that he is the Predictions Contest champion of 2022.

Congratulations also to crmalcolm, who takes his second win of the season, pipping outgoing champion smellysocks by one point.


List of World Champions

2022 - BTCC frog
2021 - smellysocks
2020 - Born Racer Fan
2019 - smellysocks
2018 - smellysocks
2017 - F1Guy
2016 - Born Racer


What happened in Abu Dhabi

BTCC frog wins the 2022 championship with a victory margin of 72 points. He extended his lead in the last round by 11 points. With the arrival of rounds with sprint races, this was a much more decisive victory than that of last year, where smellysocks beat Born Racer Fan to the 2021 title with a gap of 10 points.

The only position change in the last round was that Abu Dhabi Grand Prix winner crmalcolm overhauled Born Racer Fan for 8th position.

In the end, twelve of the fifteen entrants this year managed to win events, which was a fantastic mix.

There were twelve entries for the final round of 2022, and five people predicted Verstappen as the winner. As has become customary this year, Verstappen as victor was the most correctly-predicted finisher.

The next most accurately-predicted finisher was Vettel, guessed right by three entrants that he would come home to retirement in tenth place.

Seven of the entrants (therefore the majority) had just two drivers in their top ten who didn't feature. In six of those cases (Aysedasi, BTCC frog, smellysocks, Gnussi, wolfhound and Born Racer Fan), they had included the obvious anomalies of Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso, although round winner crmalcolm didn't have Alonso, but did have Zhou Guanyu.

Everyone else had three drivers who didn't finish in the top ten.

No-one predicted Stroll in their top ten despite him scording points in exactly a third of all Grands Prix.

Less surprisingly, no-one went for Norris for fastest lap.

Even more unsurprisingly, everyone opted for a dry race in their predictions for Abu Dhabi, which has been yet to host a wet or mixed-condition Grand Prix.

A third of the entrants (Beau2, Aysedasi, NotsoSwift and TrapezeArtist) correctly surmised that McLaren would get fastest pit stop, and everyone else went for pit stop champions Red Bull (the Milton Keynes-based team have ten wins here to the Woking sqaud's six).

Six correctly went for Vettel as Driver of the Day, although no-one got that Leclerc would get Driver of the Grand Prix (TrapezeArtist put him as Driver of the Day).

Only TrapezeArtist was right about Ferrari topping the Team of the Grand Prix poll (nine of the other eleven entrants plumped for Mercedes, with crmalcolm and myself selecting Red Bull).

steve_r, Beau2, smellysocks and I all guessed that the Rate the Grand Prix score would be a six (this number applied to both the mode and the mean), while everyone else but crmalcolm (who opted for five) chose a seven.

The mug (a sort of trophy) will be winging its way to you, BTCC frog. Thanks a lot to everyone for competing. It's been great fun running the competition and analysing the results and how we all expect Formula 1 might turn out and seeing that it sometimes goes the way we think it will, but has the capacity to surprise.

Please join us next year and here's hoping that we expand the field in 2023. If you can encourage others to have a crack next year, please do. Best wishes for a happy and wholesome rest of 2022. Cheers, everyone.


Abu Dhabi Grand Prix Results

1. Verstappen
2. Leclerc
3. Pérez
4. Sainz
5. Russell
6. Norris
7. Ocon
8. Stroll
9. Ricciardo
10. Vettel

Qualifying
1. Verstappen
2. Pérez
3. Leclerc

Fastest lap: Norris
Fastest pit stop: McLaren
Weather: Dry
formula1.com Driver of the Day: Vettel
Driver of the Grand Prix: Leclerc
Team of the Grand Prix: Ferrari
Rate the Grand Prix: 6 (mode) & 6 (mean, rounded up from 5.85).


Abu Dhabi Grand Prix Predictions Contest Results

1. crmalcolm - 92
2. smellysocks - 91
3. Gnussi - 89
4. Notso Swift - 86
5. BTCC frog - 85
6. wolfhound - 81
7. Born Racer - 76
8. steve_r - 74
9. TrapezeArtist - 72
10. Born Racer Fan - 70
11. Beau2 - 68
12. Aysedasi - 60


Championship standings after Round 22 of 22

1. BTCC frog - 1947
2. steve_r - 1875
3. Born Racer - 1836
4. Beau2 - 1832
5. smellysocks - 1823
6. Gnussi - 1814
7. TrapezeArtist - 1776
8. crmalcolm - 1732
9. Born Racer Fan - 1711
10. wolfhound - 1672
11. gert - 1441
12. Notso Swift - 1390
13. Aysedasi - 1321
14. chunterer - 1216
15. Teretonga - 109


Total number of wins this season

steve_r - 5

BTCC frog - 4

Beau2 - 3

Born Racer - 2
wolfhound - 2
crmalcolm - 2

TrapezeArtist - 1
smellysocks - 1
gert - 1
Aysedasi - 1
Gnussi - 1
crmalcolm - 1


Winners by event

Bahrain: TrapezeArtist
Saudi Arabia: steve_r
Australia: steve_r
Emilia-Romagna: steve_r
Miami: steve_r
Spain: smellysocks
Monaco: Beau2
Azerbaijan: Beau2
Canada: BTCC frog
Great Britain: gert
Austria: wolfhound
France: Born Racer
Hungary: Aysedasi
Belgium: Born Racer
The Netherlands: BTCC frog
Italy: Beau2 & BTCC frog
Singapore: crmalcolm
Japan: Gnussi
United States: wolfhound
Mexico: BTCC frog
Brazil: steve_r
Abu Dhabi: crmalcolm

[Aysedasi]

Oh dear, I definitely finished on a low.....but having missed a few rounds I can't complain. And I did get a wholly unexpected race win! Onwards and upwards next season! And really big thanks to you Born Racer for all of the effort you put into this!

[Born Racer]

It was great fun. I loved it. It really makes you consider what you think is likely to happen.

[Aysedasi]

It does, but I've always had the mindset of predicting the unusual.... which is probably why I don't do very well!

[crmalcolm]

Congratulations BTCC frog!!

Pat on the back to all round winners.

Commiserations and chin up to everyone else.

And finally - huge thanks to BR for putting this together and running another season.

[BTCC frog]

Thanks very much for putting the time and effort into running the competition, Born Racer. It has been extremely fun and I am very proud to be the world champion. I will indeed tell everyone at home and in the office about it. Thanks to my competitors as well, steve r and Beau2 who were very close all year, despite often putting the predictions in before any of the practice sessions, which was impressive. I will be back next year to hopefully defend my title, although I have now realised my lifelong dream of being world champion.

[steve_r]

There were practice sessions?


Well done BTCC. And thanks to Born Racer for running the comp.

In the early days of the season when everyone else was afraid to predict Magnussen and Bottas in the top ten, I thought that maybe this would be my year! Unfortunately like the Haas team, I was left behind as the season progressed.

[smellysocks]

Good job BTCC frog!