posted November 18, 2009 at 11:50 EST in F1 Racing Articles
Odds to Win 2010 F1 Drivers Championship
by Charles Jay
BUTTON’S ON THE MOVE AS MERCEDES BUYS INTO F1 CHAMPIONS
If you were wondering whether the car or the driver was more of a factor in Formula One races, the answer should be clear after viewing a couple of adjustments in these numbers that have been made on next year's drivers championship. Fernando Alonso, who finished ninth in the standings this year, is second on the list, just short of being a co-favorite with Lewis Hamilton. Of course, Alonso is moving over to the Ferrari team after being with Renault.
To Win 2010 F1 Drivers' Championship
- Lewis Hamilton +200
- Fernando Alonso +225
- Kimi Raikkonen +500
- Sebastian Vettel +475
- Felipe Massa +650
- Jenson Button +900
- Mark Webber +1000
- Nico Rosberg +1200
- Robert Kubica +2500
- Rubens Barrichello +3000
- Nick Heidfeld +7500
- Heikki Kovalainen +7500
- Adrian Sutil +7500
- Jarno Trulli +10000
- Timo Glock +10000
Rubens Barrichello, who had a chance to win the overall championship going into the last several weeks of the season, and finally finished third as part of the Brawn GP team, is now 30/1 in the BetUS F1 odds as he has moved over to the Williams team. His Brawn teammate, Jenson Button, who actually won the individual championship, is listed at +900 at BetUS, and maybe part of that reason is that Button is leaving Brawn GP in going to McLaren, for an offer of $10 million over three years, to join Hamilton on a team that now has the last two world champions. Yes, the silly season is in full bloom!
What's kind of interesting is that the McLaren team, which has Hamilton, and Ferrari, which has Alonso, both benefited from using the KERS system this past season, and KERS, as is my understanding, has been cut out of the mix for next season. It is generally suspected, though, that Ferrari, which anticipated a new lineup of drivers with several races to go, suspended improvements in the car for this season to concentrate on next season, so there is no reason to believe that this team, which was fourth in the constructors' standings, won't be very formidable in 2010.
Ferrari returns with Felipe Massa next year, and Massa recently took a few demonstration laps in the team's 2009 car at an event at Valencia. The bench is deep, with test drivers Giancarlo Fisichella, Luca Badoer and Marc Gene retained. Fisichella and Badoer both competed in F1 races for Ferrari this season. Also, there is talk that Ferrari was petitioning to get a third car approved, which would make room for a possible comeback for Michael Schumacher.
Barrichello's departure from Brawn was expected, but Button's move was probably the result of the transaction involving the Brawn team, which picked up new investors this week. Daimler (parent of Mercedes-Benz) has purchased 75% of Brawn GP, in partnership with Aabar Investments, an Abu Dhabi-based investment company (which itself is a major shareholder in Daimler), and has sold its 40% stake in McLaren back to that team. So Brawn GP, which won the constructors' title this past season, will now be known as Mercedes Grand Prix. The price tag on the deal is around $185 million.
Mercedes, however, will continue to sell engines to the McLaren team (and will do so through at least 2015), and it already was supplying the engines for Ross Brawn's team, so there will be some continuity. Brawn will remain in charge of the day-to-day operations of the team. This is all good news for F1, which saw Honda pull out during the last off-season, with the team morphing into Brawn GP, and has witnessed the withdrawal of both BMW and Toyota recently. Mercedes and Lotus are two manufacturers who are re-entering F1 competition with racing teams.
The decision on who will drive for the Mercedes team will be left up to Brawn, and there has been widespread speculation that Daimler wanted one German driver to represent its brand. The logical choice is Nico Rosberg (+1200 to win the title), German-born and one of the finest young drivers on the grid, who competed for Williams this past year but left. It is a foregone conclusion that he will ink a deal with Mercedes, you can expect Rosberg's chances to win the world title to increase dramatically.
The next time BetUS.com posts futures on the drivers' championship, they might include Kamui Kobayashi, who did so well in the final two races of this past season (subbing for Timo Glock with Toyota and scoring three points), who could be headed to the new Lotus team. Meanwhile, it is quite possible that the team has already signed Jarno Trulli (100/1 to win the 2010 title), who was 8th in the standings this season for Toyota and has been flirting with a NASCAR career, but it hasn't made any announcements yet.
