The FIA has revised its superlicence points system, reducing the points offered by several championships and expanding the number of series it covers.
Formula E, Japanese Super Formula, Formula V8 3.5, Formula Three, the World Endurance Championship (LMP1 class) and GP3 will all award fewer points under the revised system.
Among the new series added to the system are the World Endurance Championship (LMP2, LMGT-Pro and LMGT-Am class), Asian and European Le Mans Series (prototype classes), IMSA (prototype and GTLM classes), Japanese Super GT, NASCAR cup and national levels, Formula Mazda and International GT3.
Drivers must still score a minimum of 40 points over a three-year period in order to qualify for an F1 superlicence.
New 2018 F1 superlicence points structure
Where the value of a finishing position has changed the previous value is listed in brackets:
| Classification in the final overall points standings | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | 6th | 7th | 8th | 9th | 10th |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| FIA Formula Two | 40 | 40 | 40 | 30 | 20 | 10 | 8 | 6 | 4 | 3 |
| GP2 Series* | 40 | 40 | 30 | 20 | 10 | 8 | 6 | 4 | 3 | 2 |
| IndyCar** | 40 | 30 | 20 | 10 | 8 | 6 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 1 |
| FIA European Formula Three | 30 (40) | 25 (30) | 20 | 10 | 8 | 6 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 1 |
| FIA Formula E | 30 (40) | 25 (30) | 20 | 10 | 8 | 6 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 1 |
| FIA WEC (LMP1) | 30 (40) | 24 (30) | 20 | 16 (10) | 12 (8) | 10 (6) | 8 (4) | 6 (3) | 4 (2) | 2 (1) |
| GP3 Series | 25 (30) | 20 | 15 | 10 | 7 | 5 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 |
| Formula V8 3.5** | 20 (35) | 15 (25) | 10 (20) | 8 (15) | 6 (10) | 4 (7) | 3 (5) | 2 (3) | 1 (2) | 0 (1) |
| Japanese Super Formula** | 20 (25) | 15 (20) | 10 (15) | 8 (10) | 6 (7) | 4 (5) | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 |
| FIA WEC (LMP2) | 20 | 16 | 12 | 10 | 8 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| FIA WTCC | 15 | 12 | 10 | 7 | 5 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| DTM** | 15 | 12 | 10 | 7 | 5 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Japanese Super GT** | 15 | 12 | 10 | 7 | 5 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| NASCAR Cup** | 15 | 12 | 10 | 7 | 5 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Indy Lights** | 15 | 12 | 10 | 7 | 5 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| International V8 Supercars** | 13 | 11 | 9 | 6 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| IMSA Prototype** | 12 | 10 | 8 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| National FIA Formula 4 | 12 | 10 | 7 | 5 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| National F3** | 10 | 7 | 5 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Formula Renault (EuroCup, ALPS, or NEC)** | 10 | 7 | 5 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Formula Mazda** | 10 | 7 | 5 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| NASCAR National** | 10 | 7 | 5 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Asian/ELMS (Prototype)** | 10 | 8 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| FIA WEC (LMGT- Pro)** | 10 | 8 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| FIA WEC (LMGT- Am)** | 10 | 8 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| IMSA GTLM** | 10 | 8 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| International GT3 Series** | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Formula Academy (FFSA) | 5 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| CIK-FIA World Championships Senior category | 4 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| CIK-FIA Continental Championships in Senior category | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| CIK-FIA World Championships in Junior category | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| CIK-FIA Continental Championships in Junior category | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
*Points applicable to 2015 and 2016 only.
**Subject to all road course rounds being held on tracks homologated by the FIA.
2018 F1 season
- McLaren staff told us we were “totally crazy” to take Honda engines in 2018 – Tost
- ‘It doesn’t matter if we start last’: How Red Bull’s junior team aided Honda’s leap forward
- Honda’s jet division helped F1 engineers solve power unit problem
- McLaren Racing losses rise after Honda split
- Ricciardo: Baku “s***show” was Red Bull’s fault
nase
21st September 2017, 23:07
Now that’s an interesting detail. I wonder what the IndyCar ranking would look like after applying this criterion.
nase
21st September 2017, 23:33
Soo, apparently, only two rounds of the 2017 IndyCar season would be considered: The Indy GP and Watkins Glen.
Therefore:
1. Dixon (40)
2. Power (30)
3. Rossi (20)
4. Hunter-Reay (10)
5. Castroneves (8)
6. Rahal (6)
7. Pagenaud (4)
8. Chilton (3)
9. Pigot (2)
10. Muñoz/Kimball? (1)
TheReminder
22nd September 2017, 4:38
Current homologated tracks as of July 2017(FIA)
Grade 1
Indianapolis grand prix
Grade 2
Barber motorsports park
Long beach
Road america-elkhart lake
St. petersburg
Watkins glen
Not graded(will be soon I guess)
Toronto(Exhibition place)
Mid-Ohio
Sonoma
nase
22nd September 2017, 12:31
That list makes more sense than what I’d found after a quick google search. The document I started from (homologated tracks as of September 2016) only included the circuits I mentioned.
FlyingLobster27
22nd September 2017, 7:18
Sonoma? Watkins Glen? Mid-Ohio? Road America? Barber?
However, including NASCAR on the list and saying “providing all road course races are held” is more of a joke. There are literally only two on the NASCAR Cup calendar.
FlyingLobster27
22nd September 2017, 7:19
(Sorry, Watkins Glen was on your list, nase.)
Corey (@dragon86)
22nd September 2017, 13:33
NASCAR has three national touring series, Monster Energy Cup, Xfinity Series, and Camping World Truck Series. Between them, there are 5 road courses in question.
Cup: Sonoma, Watkins Glen
Xfinity: Mid-Ohio, Watkins Glen, Road America
Trucks: Bowmanville
Next year, NASCAR is actually adding another road course to the Cup schedule. They’ll be using the infield road course at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Jorge Olivier
22nd September 2017, 22:00
@nase. The points are for the final position on the championship, not for the position on those tracks.
nase
24th September 2017, 19:43
@ Jorge Olivier
That’s not how I understood it, as that’d make the annotation meaningless.
Jason Miller (@flatdarkmars)
21st September 2017, 23:15
A continuing, transparent attempt to corral young drivers into FIA & FOM owned-and-approved series. It’s their business, and it’s their prerogative to run it that way if they like, but it doesn’t do anything to support the notion that F1 is the pinnacle of motorsports and that only the very best drivers fill its grid.
MattDS (@mattds)
22nd September 2017, 8:46
Well, they’re making steady progress in completely eradicating FR3.5/FV8 3.5.
Just one more year and it’ll be gone surely.
PeterG
21st September 2017, 23:46
this whole super license points thing is stupid & totally unnecessary.
if a team feels that some kid in f3 or lower is good enough for f1 then they should be allowed to hire them. with this stupid points system in place there would have been several very good drivers that wouldn’t have made it to f1 when they did & perhaps not made it at all as often its not just about making it to f1 but its also about getting there at the right time with the right team.
take the red bull program. lets say they wanted to bring in verstappen from f3 but were unable to so instead brought up one of there drivers from f2 who ended up been exceptionally good, a year later maybe there isn’t the room for verstappen that there was before so he ends up sitting on the sidelines or something.
anon
22nd September 2017, 8:01
PeterG, the public backlash against the initial decision by Red Bull to hire Verstappen is the main reason that this system came in in the first place, since so many people complained that Red Bull shouldn’t be allowed to bring such an inexperienced and young driver into F1 in the first place.
Because we had fans insist that drivers should spend more time in junior series and learn their racecraft there, rather than doing so in F1, the points system was brought in to prevent drivers being brought into F1 at an age that many perceived to be too young and too inexperienced – so this is the inevitable consequence of what the fans wanted.
Aapje (@aapje)
22nd September 2017, 19:00
What some fans wanted.
Any claim that all fans want the same thing is nonsense.
smudgersmith1 (@smudgersmith1)
21st September 2017, 23:58
ah, thanks FIA so this is how a monopoly works.
Stephen Crowsen (@drycrust)
22nd September 2017, 0:50
When I see First Place for Japanese Super Formula earns 20 points while GP3’s First Place person gets 25 points, one can’t but help think something is amiss. I would have thought the allocation of points should be based upon how close to F1 cars those used in a particular series are, so Japanese Super Formula cars, which have 543+ hp, should have more points than GP3 cars, which are about 280 hp+.
zeus_m3
22nd September 2017, 1:10
Other than monetary reason. one has to consider the depth of the field and tracks that are similar to F1. But I agree, Super Formula should rank higher than GP3 and much higher than LMP1 since it’s not even a spec series and freeriding a good teammate can get you a lot of points.
MattDS (@mattds)
22nd September 2017, 8:41
@drycrust GP3 cars have about 400HP.
That being said, it’s hard isn’t it… I don’t think it should be ranked by HP, because that would e.g. have elevated the (now defunct) AutoGP series (550HP) to the same level as F2 was. No way the driver quality in that series would have merited such a status.
I don’t feel Super Formula should be at the same level as the similarly specced F2. Mainly because I feel the influx of young drivers is far more competitive in F2 (with a huge European single seater pyramid below, being national F4 series, national F3 series, FR1.6 & FR2.0, GP3) than it is in Super Formula which is too much of a Japanese series with a few European drivers.
Kevin
22nd September 2017, 3:50
Nascar Cup only runs 2 road courses a year and only Watkins Glen is sanctioned. In 3 years they would never qualify anyway. Why would they even add them? If this was around 10 years ago when the Nascar National Series went to Mexico, Canada, and Watkins Glen, they would have 3 tracks to choose from and could have made 40 in 3 years and the Cup guys wouldn’t have made it to 40 in 3 years because all they would have had was Watkins Glen. Kind of a weird system when the lower ranks of a series could have a chance to hit 40 when the top tier could not mathematically. The National Series races on more road courses than the cup series does.
TheReminder
22nd September 2017, 4:42
NASCAR National has xfinity(4(2-OK)-Glen, Sonoma(which will get added soon), Road America, and Mid-Ohio(Same boat as Sonoma)) and Trucks(Mosport(CAN)), NASCAR Cup(Glen, Sonoma, Charlotte Road) is not NASCAR National
Julian (Mr. Sakura) (@xiasitlo)
22nd September 2017, 4:02
For over 10 years I’ve hold the position that IndyCar demands a Tier-S point ranking as it combines the close racing of F2 with a enormous pressure that F2 drivers will have in F1 regarding audiences, different tracks and PR-management, adjusting to tracks, tactical decisions, nearly the only requiring just the same ~2h top-notch consistent concentration and giving the same importance to the formats of F1 (qualifying, cautions, stewards, car technology) used and much more making it far more demanding then F2 or the new WEC or FE for example.
The only thing I’m not fond of is the lack of more suppliers and chassis modification, but then again knowing a Ferrari would be on the podium in the Schumi era was not that great either because of increased gaps the influx of free budget cash would bring. But…
If automatic promotion (and sustaining in F1 after) was truly able between the F2 and F1 I would not hold this position but until then I don’t see this list as a fair list. Maybe Liberty should join forces with IndyCar during some weekends. As Equals. Let the masses decide which race looked better.
Tifoso1989 (@tifoso1989)
22nd September 2017, 8:12
This hole non-sense ridiculous Todt agenda (Engine formula,sporting rules,super licence….) is just killing the sport. F1 needs another sex scandal.
Patrickl (@patrickl)
22nd September 2017, 20:11
The new engine formula was started by Mosley. In fact, back then his idea was even worse. He wanted a 4 cilinder inline “world engine” of which the basic block would be used in all FIA racing series. Tuned to different levels of performance.
sean
22nd September 2017, 8:16
Bun FIA
spoutnik (@spoutnik)
22nd September 2017, 8:19
Is it me or the 3rd place in GP2 championship has dropped from 40 to 30 awarded points? If so, does that mean that Matsushita does face an even greater challenge to be in F1 next year?
He is currently standing at 6th place and 37 points adrift of the 3rd place. Obtaining second raises it to 44 points and there is a maximum of 96 points to grab in the 4 remaining races.
I really doubt he will make it this year.
spoutnik (@spoutnik)
22nd September 2017, 8:21
Ok, I misread the table about GP2 that describe only past championships while F2 has its own line.
Damon (@damon)
22nd September 2017, 15:59
So they’re saying a driving GENIUS – rallying World Champion – Sebastien Loeb, and the likes of him, couldn’t get into Formula 1.
OK…
anon
22nd September 2017, 18:21
@damon, in the case of Loeb, he was never eligible anyway – he tried to participate in a race in F1 a number of years ago for Toro Rosso (as a publicity stunt for Red Bull), but was unable to persuade the FIA to grant him a superlicence.
However, he did later admit that, in retrospect, it probably was a blessing in disguise that he had been turned down, as he admitted that his physical fitness would probably have been inadequate anyway.
Damon (@damon)
23rd September 2017, 12:53
Which was pathetic on FIA’s side.
Loeb has verified that taking part in the season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix of 2009 was a real possibility, although he was not granted a necessary Super Licence by motorsport governing body the FIA.
“I would have been driving for Toro Rosso and that wasn’t a car that could have won, so I wasn’t prepared to do it,” he continued. “I would have got in the car at Abu Dhabi in 2009 and driven the race without any advance practice sessions.”
Damon (@damon)
23rd September 2017, 12:55
Loeb finished the 24h Le Mans in the 2nd place in 2006, so yeah, not a guy to deserve an F1 licence.
PT (@pt)
23rd September 2017, 6:47
I hate this practice of apportioning points to championships. It’s just a tool by the FIA to manipulate stuff in favour of its baby, Formula 2. I’m quoting a comment I posted on the Racer site as a response to another comment:
“In any case, that initial Superlicense points system didn’t do FR 3.5 any favours as well. Back then it was so popular and competitive that upcoming drivers and F1 teams’ junior driver programs used to bypass GP2 (now F2) entirely on the road to F1. GP2 was much more expensive than FR 3.5 but latter was giving them equal, if not better, training. The FIA didn’t like that.
Even the WEC LMP1 class hasn’t got the points it deserves – it should be right up there with IndyCar but again, the FIA doesn’t want any other Europe-based series to get more attention than its F1 support bill series. If WEC LMP1, and even LMP2, were given more points, more upcoming drivers would flock to them instead of F2. There are many new non-manufacturer entrants in LMP1 and the new season schedule would make it more of a challenge.
I’m not in favour of allotting points to championships like this. Ayrton Senna, Alain Prost, Martin Brundle, Nelson Piquet and many others came to F1 straight from F3. Michael Schumacher came from the World Sportscar Championship, after F3. And Alonso, Vettel, Kubica and Ricciardo came from FR 3.5 (now FV8 3.5) and these were among the greatest drivers of their time. None of these drivers raced in F3000 (now F2).
It’s meaningless to allot points like this. Every driver is different, and they may vary on what championship gives them the best training they need to build on. F2 isn’t the only one there, and probably not even the best. But the FIA wants to artificially make it important and the default F1 training championship.
And to think that the top three drivers in F2 get 40 points, whereas only the champion in IndyCar gets 40 is stupidity. IndyCar is tougher and a lot more competitive, as are the WEC LMP1 and LMP2 classes. Here we see the FIA putting its shrewd and cunning mind to work here to manipulate stuff to get what they want, demeaning other quality championships along the way.”