This weekends battles

You may have heard about the fight for the drivers' title and I detail a short version of the permutations below, but that isn't the only thing up for grabs. The prize money in F1 is determined by constructors' championship position and there are some places up for grabs, some more so than others.

Drivers:
Realistically, drivers only care about winning titles. Having a 4th, an 8th or a 14th on your CV doesn't matter much, compared to one place higher or lower. Therefore I will only analyse the title hunt:

Alonso will win if:

• He finishes 1st or 2nd
• Webber finishes 2nd and Alonso finishes 4th (assuming Vettel wins) or 5th (otherwise)

Webber will win if:

• He finishes 1st AND Alonso does not finish 2nd
• He finishes 2nd AND Vettel does not win AND Alonso finishes 6th or lower

Vettel will win if:

• He finishes 1st AND Alonso finishes 5th or lower
• He finishes 2nd AND Alonso finishes 9th or lower AND Webber finishes 5th or lower

Hamilton will win if:

• He wins AND Alonso does not score AND Webber finishes 6th or lower AND Vettel finishes 3rd or lower

Constructors:

• Ferrari need to gain 32 points on McLaren (assuming a win) or a 2-3 finish with McLaren scoring no points at all to finish 2nd
• Force India must outscore Williams by 2 points or by 1 if they achieve a 4th place finish to secure 6th, UNLESS
• Sauber must outscore Force India by 24 points and Williams by 25 to join the battle for 6th
• Toro Rosso must outscore Sauber by 33 points to finish 8th
• Lotus, Virgin or Hispania must outscore Toro Rosso by 11 points to finish 9th
• In the fight for 10th place Lotus will win UNLESS either Virgin or Hispania secure a top 11 finish
• There is no prize money for 11th, so it doesn't matter much that Virgin require a 13th place finish or better to overtake Hispania

November 18th version of grid

Button to McLaren, Mercedes buy-out Brawn... So much happening, so little time!
Here's the latest grid, as I understand it (CONFIRMED DRIVERS in capitals).

McLAREN: 1. BUTTON 2. HAMILTON (Mercedes engine)
MERCEDES: 3. ROSBERG 4. Heidfeld (maybe Kubica if Renault pull out)
RED BULL: 5. VETTEL 6. WEBBER (Renault engine)
FERRARI: 7. ALONSO 8. MASSA (not sure of driver numbers)
TOYOTA: withdrawn - penalties likely since they signed Concorde agreement to 2012.
SAUBER: 9. Heidfeld 10. A Ferrari junior (Ferrari engines, place not confirmed until penalty for Toyota sorted)
WILLIAMS: 11. BARRICHELLO 12. HULKENBERG (Cosworth engines)
RENAULT: 14. KUBICA 15. Di Grassi (may withdraw, Grosjean and many others in frame for drive)
FORCE INDIA: 16. Sutil 17. De La Rosa (Mercedes engine, Sutil near confirmed, Liuzzi contender for other seat, as are 6 others, approx)
TORO ROSSO: 18. BUEMI 19. Alguersuari (Ferrari engine, Bortolotti and others in contention for #2 drive)
CAMPOS META: 20. SENNA 21. Alguersuari (Cosworth engine, preference for a Spanish driver, numbers 20-27 unknown)
US F1: 22. Wurz 23. Andretti (Cosworth engine, little is known about driver choices)
MANOR (VIRGIN): 24. GLOCK 25. Piquet (Cosworth engine, little known about 2nd driver)
LOTUS: 26. Kovaleinen 27. Trulli(Cosworth engine, 1 driver signed but anonymous)

There are 13 drives still to fight over and I'll list 20 drivers below who stand a decent chance:

Drivers not yet confirmed (from above list, likely to get drives):
1. Heidfeld (Mercedes or Sauber)
2. Sutil (Force India)
3. Alguersuari (Toro Rosso or Campos Meta)
4. Wurz (US F1)
5. Kovaleinen (Lotus or Campos)
6. Trulli (Lotus or USF1)

With a fair chance (above list and otherwise):
7. Kobayashi (any)
8. Di Grassi (Renault)

9. De La Rosa (Campos or Force India)

10. Grosjean (Renault or new team)
11. Liuzzi (Force India or new team)
12. Sato (Lotus or any)
13. Davidson (Manor or any)
14. Bortollotti (Toro Rosso, Sauber or Campos)
15. Carroll (Manor or any)
16. Soucek (any)
17. Andretti (USF1)
18. Pantano (any new)
19. Piquet jnr (any new)
20. Petrov (any new)

Amended best-guess grid 2010

*indicates far from certain, alternatives/explanation in brackets)

Brawn - Mercedes
1. Jenson Button
2. Nico Rosberg

Red Bull *Renault (Mercedes blocked by McLaren, Ferrari unlikely due to previous strife)
3. Sebastian Vettel
4. Mark Webber

McLaren Mercedes
5. Lewis Hamilton
*6. Kimi Räikkönen (Heidfeld, Glock, even Kovaleinen)

Ferrari
7. Felipe Massa
8. Fernando Alonso (not sure which way around the numbering will go)

Toyota - *will not exist, nor be directly replaced

Sauber Qadbak Ferrari
9. Nick Heidfeld
10. * (Kobayashi, Bortolotti, many others in with a chance here)

Williams Cosworth
11. Rubens Barrichello (had Toyota not left, he'd have had the number 14 he started his career with)
12. Nico Hulkenberg

*Renault (likely to stay, but not certain)
14. Robert Kubica
15. * (Grosjean, di Grassi, Kobayashi, Glock)

Force India Mercedes
16. Adrian Sutil
17 * (Liuzzi, Glock, Trulli, Kovaleinen)

Toro Rosso Ferrari
18. Sebastien Buemi
19. Jaime Alguersuari

Lotus *Cosworth
20. * (Sato, Davidson, Klien)
21. * (Trulli, di Grassi, Kovaleinen, AN Other)

US F1 *Cosworth
22. * (Danica Patrick, Scott Speed, Marco Andretti, Wickens)
23. * (Fisichella, De La Rosa, Gene, Trulli, Bourdais)

Campos Meta *Cosworth
24. Bruno Senna
25. * (De La Rosa, Gene, anyone Spanish, anyone else)

Manor/Virgin *Cosworth
26. * (Paffett, Davidson, ...)
27. * (Petrov, Soucek, ...)

For most of the new teams, all names are in the hat. We'll see come January who's going where.

2010 lineup (amended)

Well 2009 is nearly over, so what awaits us next year? Let's run through the grid in order:
In bold are some edits made AFTER the Abu Dhabi GP

Brawn-Mercedes
1 - Button (90% chance) 95%
2 - Rosberg (70%) 90%
If not - Barrichello, Heidfeld Heidfeld

Red Bull-Renault (or Mercedes) Renault
3 - Vettel (100%)
4 - Webber (90%)
If not - Raikkonen

McLaren Mercedes
5 - Hamilton (100%)
6 - Raikkonen (60%) 80%
If not - Button, Kovaleinen, Heidfeld

Ferrari
7 - Alonso (100%)
8 - Massa (90%)
If not - Fisichella

Toyota
9 - Trulli (60%) Kobayashi (90%)
10 - Kobayashi (50%)
If not - Raikkonen, Glock, Barrichello, Nakajima, Heidfeld, Sato

Williams - Cosworth (Renault, Mercedes?) Cosworth
11 - Barrichello (70%) CONFIRMED
12 - Hulkenberg (80%) CONFIRMED
If not - Rosberg, Glock, Kovaleinen, Heidfeld

Renault
14 - Kubica (100%)
15 - Grosjean (60%) Glock (70%)
If not - di Grassi, Senna, Heidfeld, Glock

Force India Mercedes
16 - Sutil (80%) 90%
17 - Liuzzi (50%) Kovaleinen (50%)
If not - Paffett, Senna, Heidfeld, Glock, Kovaleinen

Toro Rosso Ferrari
18 - Buemi (90%)
19 - Alguersuari (90%)
If not - Hartley, Bortolotti

?Lotus - Cosworth?
??
??
From - Trulli, Heidfeld, Kovaleinen, Davidson, Glock, etc

Campos - Cosworth
Senna CONFIRMED
??
From - De La Rosa? Any of the above drivers who aren't chosen

US F1 Cosworth
??
??
From - Heidfeld, rookies, Americans, any of the drivers who miss out above

Manor/Virgin - Cosworth
??
??
From - Anyone. Suggestions welcome

2010 and the WMSC

Last week the World Motorsport Council (WMSC) was gathered to pass judgement on McLaren, following their misleading of stewards in Melbourne. The punishment (in addition to the already-imposed disqualification): a three race suspended ban, to be imposed only if a further breach of the same rule occurs within 12 months. In other words, no further punishment, but watch your step.

However, more important were some decisions about next year's rules:
1) The number of entries permitted to be 13 instead of 12 (following several applications, there might be 26 cars on the grid for the first time in ages).
2) Voluntary budget cap of £40m or €45m (I haven't seen which is the official version, but most media, from the UK, Spain and Germany, quote both). If budget is not followed, teams must not have adjustable wings, and must have their engine revs capped.
3) Refuelling banned (supposed justification - give advantage to any team that can develop a fuel efficient engine).
4) Increase in minimum weight from 605kg to 620kg. This will allow heavier drivers some ballast even if they use KERS (a system that weighs about 30kg).

The teams mostly back the plans, but Ferrari are livid about the budget cap, whilst Williams want it to be compulsory. The big test for the teams is whether they can produce and maintain a united response to these changes (they suit the 5 privateers better than the 5 manufacturer teams - BMW, Ferrari, McLaren, Renault and Toyota).