Grid Bids FAQ

[Waldorf]

1. How many drivers can I pick?
You can choose as many drivers as you can afford with your 30 bid points.

2. Who decides the price for each driver?
Each driver’s price is the average of his points for the previous five races. If a driver’s previous five classifications are 9th, 3rd, 5th, DNF, and 7th, his price for the next race will be (2+10+6+0+4)/5 = 4.4 points.

3. Can I save my bid points for the next race?
No. Your 30 points are only valid for the current race. Any amount that you do not spend on drivers is lost forever.

4. If I am going on vacation, can I make my picks for the next two or three races?
Sorry, but no. We would like to allow you to do this, but the driver prices change for each race, so it is impossible to pick for future races. The only way around this is to have a friend (or one of the FMB admins) make your picks for you, based on whatever instructions you may provide (e.g. “Pick Montoya unless he is worth more than 9.5 points”). Or, as suggested by Alex, "Find an internet café!"

5. What if I have made my picks, but then I change my mind?
No problem! You can change your picks as many times as you like until the deadline, with no penalty.

6. Should I make my picks at the last second so nobody can copy me?
The features that allow people to see your picks are disabled until the deadline has passed. This means that nobody can see your picks before they submit their own. You should submit picks for each race as soon as possible, so you do not take a ‘zero’ if you forget the deadline or have internet access problems.

7. If one of my drivers becomes sick or injured, can I change my picks?
Sorry, but anything that happens after the deadline is part of the unpredictability of Formula 1. Car failures, collisions, penalties, disqualifications, and injury are all part of the game.

8. Why are no points awarded for pole position, fastest lap, or most laps led?
Everything the drivers do on a race weekend is designed to give them the best possible finishing position in the race. Pole position is only valuable because it helps to increase a driver’s chance of winning the race. He gets no points for taking pole position, so neither do you.

9. What strategy should I use when making picks?
The easy answer to this question is “pick the drivers who will score a lot of points for you”. This always seems easy in hindsight, when you look back at the race and say “I knew I should have picked Villeneuve!”, but it is really not that easy. What you need to do is play the percentages.
i. Pick drivers who have been having bad luck; avoid drivers who have been having good luck;
ii. If the weather forecast calls for rain, pick good rain drivers and/or cars with good rain tires;
iii. Some drivers do very well at certain tracks (e.g. Monaco), and you can take advantage of this;
iv. Pick undervalued drivers even if you don’t like them; avoid overvaluing the drivers you like (Many people thought Montoya was worth much more than Ralf, but in all of 2002, Montoya averaged 6.8 points and Ralf averaged 6.0 points.);
v. Make sure to take reliability into consideration. If a driver always finishes on the podium, but his car fails half the time, it would be foolish to expect him to score 10 points for you.
vi. It is tempting to pick all backmarkers, because you can ‘own’ 14 drivers for the race. But this is almost never the way to score well.

10. How much of the game is skill, and how much is luck?
This is hard to say, but there is a great deal of luck involved. If the F1 season was ten thousand races, the players who are really good at making predictions would certainly come out on top. But in a seventeen race season, a little bit of luck can go a long way.

[tom]

2. Who decides the price for each driver?
Each driver’s price is the average of his points for the previous five races. If a driver’s previous five classifications are 9th, 3rd, 5th, DNF, and 7th, his price for the next race will be (2+10+6+0+4)/5 = 4.4 points.

then why new drivers don't have 0.5 points,but have 1.5 or 1.9 pts?

[Waldorf]

2. Who decides the price for each driver?
Each driver’s price is the average of his points for the previous five races. If a driver’s previous five classifications are 9th, 3rd, 5th, DNF, and 7th, his price for the next race will be (2+10+6+0+4)/5 = 4.4 points.

then why new drivers don't have 0.5 points,but have 1.5 or 1.9 pts?

I know I didn't explain the initial driver prices for the start of the season, but I wanted to keep the FAQ brief. We estimate a driver's value for the start of the season in one of two ways:
-- i) if he is with the same team as last season, take his average points per race (with our points system) from last season;
-- ii) if he is new to F1 or new to a team, use the average points from last season of his teammate or the driver he is replacing (or make up a score that seems reasonable).
We know some teams will be better than last season and some teams will be worse, but we don't put too much effort into these initial prices. As long as they are reasonable, the game works well.

We then imagine that there were 5 races at the end of last season, and the driver scored exactly his average points at each of these imaginary races. For the first 5 races of this season, the driver's price is a mixture of his imaginary finishes from last season and his real finishes from this season.

[Jenzy]

i was just wondering if u can play with two usernames. i want to sign up as "Jenzy" but i thought i might as well use "ralf_rulez" as well since it's already registered. is that allowed?

[Jay]

i was just wondering if u can play with two usernames. i want to sign up as "Jenzy" but i thought i might as well use "ralf_rulez" as well since it's already registered. is that allowed?

No, you should only play with one username. But if you would rather play under Jenzy than ralf-rulez that certainly can be arranged.

[Jessepap]

i was wondering do you have to submit your picks BEFORE the qual session starts on saturday starts?? when is the deadline for the picks to be in for the melbourne GP?
thanks

[Rory]

At the moment I have two accounts:

One is Xytech and the other one is Rory. I would like to use Rory. Can Xytech be deleted?

[tom]

the deadline is somewhere around Thursday and Wednesday for Monaco

[arthur]

how many points do you get for a win? and for second place? I can`t find it, somebody please ?!

[MixMasterMike]

how many points do you get for a win? and for second place? I can`t find it, somebody please ?!

Go to the "submit picks" session and you'll see the scores. Here they are:

Winner 15
2nd 12
3rd 10
4th 8
5th 6
6th 5
7th 4
8th 3
9th 2
10th 1

[arthur]

how many points do you get for a win? and for second place? I can`t find it, somebody please ?!

Go to the "submit picks" session and you'll see the scores. Here they are:

Winner 15
2nd 12
3rd 10
4th 8
5th 6
6th 5
7th 4
8th 3
9th 2
10th 1

ok thanks MMM

[Brière]

[WHATEVER ]

well, I'd like you to add another thing : How do the grid bids work ?

I'd like to enter, but I dont understand a single bit

[Waldorf]

[WHATEVER ]

well, I'd like you to add another thing : How do the grid bids work ?

I'd like to enter, but I dont understand a single bit

It's really simple.

Each race, you get 30 points to "spend" on any drivers you like.

After the race, the top 10 classified drivers get points based on where they finished:
1st = 15 points
2nd = 12 points
3rd = 10 points
4th = 8 points
5th = 6 points
6th = 5 points
7th = 4 points
8th = 3 points
9th = 2 points
10th = 1 point

You get the points for any of the drivers you bought. Your score for the round is the total of all their points.

That's all you really need to know.

Each driver's price is based on how many points he's been scoring. Obviously, you want to buy cheap drivers who will score well in the next race.

The easiest thing to do is to go to http://www.gridbids.com, register, and start making picks on the easy-to-use picks page. You can't really go too wrong.

[Brière]

I've been trying to understand during the past month, and I still dont get a tiny bit

[Brière]

I've been trying to understand during the past month, and I still dont get a tiny bit

has anyone read this ?

I wanna be in, but I dont know what to do

[Waldorf]

I've been trying to understand during the past month, and I still dont get a tiny bit

has anyone read this ?

I wanna be in, but I dont know what to do

Firstly -- don't over-analyse the game. It is really very simple. At this point in the season, the prices of the drivers are generally quite close to what they should return (on average). If you are lucky and pick the drivers who have a great race, you'll score well. If you are unlucky and pick the drivers who crash into each other at Turn 1, you'll do poorly.

There are only 5 races to go in the season. Just sign up and make some picks. After the race, have a look at your picks and say to yourself, "I'm so smart!" or "Argh! I knew I should have picked Sato!", just like everyone else. After two or three races, you'll understand the game as well as anybody else.

It's free. It's easy. Nothing bad happens to you if you make bad picks. Just go for it.

[edit]I notice you made picks for the French GP. Just keep doing the same thing, and you'll be fine.[/edit]

[LOUD HOWARD]

Nothing bad happens to you if you make bad picks.

Poor Nood

[Brière]

At this point in the season, the prices of the drivers are generally quite close to what they should return (on average). If you are lucky and pick the drivers who have a great race, you'll score well. If you are unlucky and pick the drivers who crash into each other at Turn 1, you'll do poorly.

It's all chinese to me And what are those prices ?

:E// well, I think I could understand more if someone shows me an example

[Didier]

At this point in the season, the prices of the drivers are generally quite close to what they should return (on average). If you are lucky and pick the drivers who have a great race, you'll score well. If you are unlucky and pick the drivers who crash into each other at Turn 1, you'll do poorly.

It's all chinese to me And what are those prices ?

:E// well, I think I could understand more if someone shows me an example

Uh.. Try it.. it's really really simple, I don,t see how it is possible not to understand Gridbids...

[Brière]

it's the whole thing about prices that is chinese

I remember that I picked my drivers randomly for Magny-Cours, as I didnt understand anything and I still dont

[LOUD HOWARD]

The better the drivers have gone in the last 5 races the higher priced they are. So Schumacher is really expensive (15 points), while people like Pantano are really cheap because they aren't doing so well.

You have to try and pick as many people that you think will be in the top 10.

Now you could pick Schumacher, he's probably guranteed to be in the top 10, but he costs half your allocated "points", so even if he wins he'd only doing a one for one return. Somone like Barrichello though, who's worth 8.8 or something this round is a much better buy, because chances are he'll return something like 12 points, so for your 9 points you get 12 in return which is good.

Just think back through the last few races...who has been under performing? Pick them! People like Trulli have been having a few so so races, so he's a good pick. Alonso has been on the podium a few times, do you think he'll do it again?

You should just keep playing for the last 5 rounds and you'll see how the prices for the drivers fluctuate based on their results...and then you can start to get a "feel" for people form and whatnot.

P.S: Don't listen to Waldorf, hes so far down in the points he has no idea whats going on

[Brière]

[What he wrote]

errrr, I didnt understand anything...

oh well, I think I should simply forget it

[Didier]

[What he wrote]

errrr, I didnt understand anything...

oh well, I think I should simply forget it

Can you tell me what's complicated in this??? It's as simple as it gets...

There's nothing more to add to Jeremy's explanations..

[Pep]

[What he wrote]

errrr, I didnt understand anything...

oh well, I think I should simply forget it

Yes, better, I'm starting to think you are trolling.

[Brière]

Can you tell me what's complicated in this??? It's as simple as it gets...

I'm still lost about the prices where can I see them ? and what's the deal with thoses prices ?