Why F1's Ridiculous Double Points Finale Could Give The 2014 Season A Spectacularly Stupid Ending

Even if I leave my patriotism to one side, it’s simply impossible to deny that Lewis Hamilton has done a better job than Nico Rosberg this year. Hamilton has won 10 races to Nico’s four, and only one of those four - Monaco - was won while actually racing his British team mate, with mechanical failures for Lewis making the German’s life much easier in the other three.

With two rounds to go Hamilton has a massive 24 point lead - despite having one more reliability-related retirement than Rosberg - and yet, he could still lose the championship. And it’s all thanks to the daft decision to award double points in Abu Dhabi.

Consider this scenario: Hamilton continues his run of wins to claim victory in Brazil. Depending on where Nico comes, Hamilton could have anything from a 31-49 point lead in the championship. That’d give him 11 wins to Rosberg’s four, and under normal circumstance, and under the pre-double points rule, enough of a lead to win the whole shebang there and then. But, come Abu Dhabi, if he retires due to a mechanical failure, the title could still go to his team mate. Would Rosberg be a deserving winner? I’m not so sure.

It’s not like this is an implausible prospect, either. The reliability of the Mercedes has been far from stellar this year, and due to its outright pace, if one of the cars retires, the other is almost guaranteed the win if it can reach the chequered flag. What message does it send out to the world if the driver with less than half the number of wins takes the championship because of a cynical rule changed aimed at spicing up the show?

It also goes against the value F1 seems to have been placing on race victories in recent years. When the current points system came into effect in 2010, it lowered the percentage of points that second place represented over first compared to the previous system, encouraging drivers to go for the win rather than settle for a lower step on the podium. And not so long ago, Bernie Ecclestone even wanted to introduce a ‘medal’ system, giving the championship to the driver with the most wins.

Pushing all that to one side, it simply seems wrong to decide that one race is ‘worth’ more than another, just to artificially extend a championship battle. I sincerely hope that Abu Dhabi doesn’t prove to be the egg-on-face moment for F1 I fear it could be, and that this poorly-thought-out rule goes where it belongs - the bin.