Data Methodology

How the numbers are calculated, which circuits are classified as street tracks, era boundaries, and the reasoning behind every judgement call.

Street Circuit Classification

Street CircuitThe racing surface serves as a public thoroughfare — city streets, park access roads, or stadium perimeter roads — for the majority of the year. Infrastructure is temporary.

Road CoursePermanent, purpose-built racing infrastructure on private or dedicated grounds. The circuit exists solely for motorsport.

Standard classifications

Circuit	Location	Years	Status
Circuit de Monaco	Monte Carlo	1950 – present	Active
Baku City Circuit	Baku, Azerbaijan	2016 – present	Active
Marina Bay Street Circuit	Singapore	2008 – present	Active
Jeddah Corniche Circuit	Jeddah, Saudi Arabia	2021 – present	Active
Las Vegas Strip Circuit	Las Vegas, USA	2023 – present	Active
Valencia Street Circuit	Valencia, Spain	2008 – 2012	Defunct
Long Beach	California, USA	1976 – 1983	Defunct
Detroit	Michigan, USA	1982 – 1988	Defunct
Dallas	Texas, USA	1984	Defunct
Phoenix	Arizona, USA	1989 – 1991	Defunct
Adelaide	South Australia	1985 – 1995	Defunct

The following circuits don't fit cleanly into either definition. Each is a judgement call — the verdict and reasoning are documented below.

Albert Park Circuit

Melbourne, Australia · 1996 – present

Verdict

Street

Reasoning

While it feels like a permanent facility, the track is laid out on public parkland roads that are open to commuter traffic for the majority of the year. Barriers and infrastructure are assembled and dismantled annually — the same pop-up character as a city street circuit. There is no permanently closed, dedicated racing site.

Miami International Autodrome

Miami, Florida, USA · 2022 – present

Verdict

Street

Reasoning

Built on stadium perimeter roads and parking lots rather than a city boulevard. Not technically public thoroughfare, but the pop-up nature of the barriers and the absence of permanent track-side runoff areas mimic the technical constraints of a street circuit more than a permanent road course.

Sochi Autodrom

Sochi, Russia · 2014 – 2021

Verdict

Street

Reasoning

Runs on the internal road network of the Sochi Olympic Park. The roads were built for the 2014 Winter Olympics rather than racing, and the circuit configuration was temporary in nature — consistent with the multi-purpose infrastructure criterion.

Circuit Gilles Villeneuve

Montreal, Canada · 1978 – present

Verdict

Road

Reasoning

Located on Île Notre-Dame in a public park, but the track itself is a dedicated, closed-loop racing facility with a permanent pit complex and grandstands. The racing surface does not serve as public thoroughfare. Classified as a permanent road course.

Wet Weather Classification

Each session — qualifying and race — is independently classified as either Dry or Rain. There is no intermediate “damp” or “mixed” category.

RainWet conditions materially affected running — standing water on track, intermediate or wet tyres used by the majority of the field, or a safety car deployed specifically for weather.

DryAll other sessions, including sessions that began damp but dried rapidly, or where a brief shower did not change tyre strategy for the field.

Why wet qualifying was so rare before 1996

From 1950 to 1995, F1 used a two-session qualifying format: one hour on Friday, one hour on Saturday, and each driver's fastest single lap from either day determined their grid position. If conditions were dry in even one of the two sessions, almost every driver would have a competitive dry time on the books — making a wet classification for that qualifying weekend essentially impossible. A session only earns a Rain classification if wet conditions materially affected running across the entire relevant session. Only two qualifying weekends before 1996 meet that bar in the database: the 1994 Belgian Grand Prix (Barrichello's famous pole at Spa) and the 1968 German Grand Prix at the Nürburgring.

Era	Format	Key characteristics
1950 – 1995	Two-Session	Friday + Saturday, one hour each. Fastest single lap from either day sets the grid. Any dry running in either session effectively eliminates a wet classification.
1996 – 2002	One-Hour Shootout	Single one-hour session on Saturday afternoon. Drivers limited to 12 laps total. First format where a single session being wet could lock in a fully wet qualifying grid.
2003	One-Lap Shootout	Single-lap runs on Friday (to set running order) and Saturday (final grid). Each car ran in isolation.
2004	Two Single-Lap Sessions	Two separate single-lap sessions, both on Saturday.
2005 (early)	Aggregate	Times from a Saturday low-fuel lap and a Sunday race-fuel lap were summed. Abolished mid-season.
2006 – present	Knockout (Q1/Q2/Q3)	Three-part elimination format. Bottom five drivers eliminated after Q1 and Q2; top ten battle for pole in Q3. Minor tweaks over the years but format unchanged.

Weather data is sourced from historical race reports, official FIA session notes, and contemporary coverage. Classification covers race sessions from 1950 and qualifying sessions from 1994. Where records are ambiguous for early seasons, sessions default to Dry.

Era Definitions

V10 Era

1995 – 2005

Naturally aspirated 3.0 L V10 engines. Marked the transition from the turbo era to a spec engine formula.

V8 Era

2006 – 2013

Rev-limited 2.4 L V8 engines, KERS introduced in 2009. Dominated by Red Bull from 2010.

Turbo-Hybrid Era

2014 – 2021

1.6 L V6 turbocharged hybrid power units. Energy recovery (MGU-H + MGU-K). Mercedes dominance through 2020.

Ground Effect (Modern)

2022 – present

Full aerodynamic reset to ground-effect cars. Continued turbo-hybrid PUs. Max Verstappen dominance from the outset.

Seasons before 1995 (1950–1994) are fully queryable but are not grouped under a named era in the database. This period spans several distinct technical epochs — the pre-war to early modern era, the first ground-effect cars (late 1970s), the turbo era (1977–1988), and the normally aspirated transition years (1989–1994).

Other Data Decisions

2021 Sprint Qualifying — Pole Attribution

Formula 1 ran sprint qualifying at three races in 2021: the British GP (Silverstone), Italian GP (Monza), and São Paulo GP (Interlagos). For those weekends, the official pole position statistic was awarded to whoever started Sunday's race from P1 — determined by the sprint result, not traditional Saturday qualifying. The database tracks this via two flags on the qualifying table: • is_sprint_qualifying = TRUE marks sprint-race rows • is_official_pole = TRUE marks the official pole holder Key edge case — Italian GP 2021: Valtteri Bottas won the sprint but received a power-unit penalty, dropping to P19 on the grid. Max Verstappen (P2 sprint) starts from pole and receives the official pole statistic.

Dropped Scores Era (1956 – 1988)

From 1956 to 1988, the World Drivers' Championship did not count every result — only the best N finishes across the season. The exact rule changed year to year. For affected historical comparisons, the app applies manual dropped-score corrections for drivers where the adjustment materially changes career totals. The corrected drivers are: Fangio, Moss, Hawthorn, Surtees, Hill, Senna, and Prost. Career points totals for these drivers reflect their actual scored points, not raw sum of all results.

Fastest Lap Bonus Point (2019 +)

From the 2019 season onwards, the driver who sets the fastest lap during a race receives 1 bonus championship point, provided they finish in the top 10. Race results include this bonus point in the points column where applicable. For consistency, career points comparisons spanning eras will include the bonus point in post-2019 totals and exclude it before 2019 (when it did not exist).

Sprint Race Points (2022 +)

From 2022 onwards, sprint races award championship points to the top 8 finishers (8–7–6–5–4–3–2–1). Sprint results are stored separately from Grand Prix results and are added to championship points totals where relevant. Note: The 2021 sprint events did not award championship points under the original sprint qualifying format.

DNF / DNS Handling

Races where a driver Did Not Finish (DNF) or Did Not Start (DNS) are counted as non-finishes — they do not receive a finishing position. This matters for average position calculations: only classified finishes are included in the denominator. Example: if a driver starts 10 races, finishes 8, and DNFs twice, their average finishing position is calculated over 8 races, not 10. Finish rate (% of races completed) is tracked separately.

Constructor Lineage & Team Identity

F1 team identity is complex — teams rebrand, get bought, and change engine suppliers. The database tracks constructors by their registered championship name at the time. Common lineage questions: • Benetton → Renault → Lotus F1 → Renault → Alpine (same physical operation) • Tyrrell → BAR → Honda → Brawn GP → Mercedes • Jordan → Midland → Spyker → Force India → Racing Point → Aston Martin Queries that ask "all Renault results" will match only the Renault-registered entity, not the full lineage. To span the full lineage, ask specifically (e.g., "Alpine/Renault" or name a specific team era).

Safety Car & VSC

SC deployment data captured 1990-present from a curated archive of lap-by-lap deployments. The modern safety car mechanism was first deployed at the 1993 Brazilian Grand Prix — 1990, 1991, and 1992 races are covered (rows exist) but show zero deployments because the mechanism didn't exist yet. VSC tracked from its introduction in 2015 onward — earlier seasons have no VSC data (NULL, not zero). One contiguous lap run = one deployment. "Australia 2008" had 3 SC deployments across 12 laps because laps 1-2, 26-30, 44-48 are three separate runs. When you ask about a "safety car", the app defaults to FULL safety car only (the actual car). To include virtual safety cars, ask for "neutralizations", "any neutralization period", or "SC and VSC". Pre-1990 races are not covered — questions like "safety cars in the 80s" return no results. The data does not include cause, deploying steward, or the trigger driver.

Data Coverage

Dataset	Coverage	Notes
Race results	1950 – 2025	All Grands Prix
Qualifying	1950 – 2025	Lap times from 1950 (most races, via Wikipedia backfill); Q1/Q2/Q3 session breakdown from 2006+; ~81 early races have grid positions only
Sprint results	2021 – 2025	All sprint races and sprint qualifying
Practice sessions	2018 – 2025	Fastest lap per session. No practice data before 2018.
Lap times	1996 – 2025	Per-lap positions and times
Championships	1950 – 2025	Driver and constructor standings
Weather	1950 – 2025	Race sessions; qualifying from 1994. Early seasons default to Dry.
Safety car deployments	1990 – present	Per-deployment laps + per-race aggregates. Modern SC mechanism introduced 1993 (Brazilian GP); 1990-1992 are 0/0.
Virtual safety car	2015 – present	Tracked from VSC's mid-2015 introduction. Pre-2015 is NULL, not zero.

Data Sources

Race & qualifying results1994–present sourced from the Ergast / Jolpica dataset. Historical qualifying times from 1950–1993 were backfilled from Wikipedia race pages to fill gaps in the Jolpica API.

Practice sessionsFastest lap times per session (2018–present) accessed via the FastF1 Python library.

WeatherClassified from historical race reports, official FIA session notes, and contemporary race coverage.

Last updated March 2026

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