November 17, 2007

For The Love of Sport: The Final Lap: While it is obviously possible for Gordon to win the title, the question is does he have any realistic chance?

NASCAR has their final race of the season on Sunday the 18th at 3:45 pm at Homestead-Miami Speedway. There are just two drivers who still have a chance at taking home the Nextel Cup points title. Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon will have six titles between them after Sunday’s race. The only question is whether the leader Johnson will take home his second or will Gordon overcome a sizable deficit to win his fifth title. First to set the stage mathematically Jimmie Johnson has an 86 point lead. The most points that Jeff Gordon can accumulate on Sunday is 195, that is 185 for the win, 5 points for leading a lap, and another 5 if he were to lead the most laps in the race. Johnson therefore needs 110 points to clinch the title (196 to clinch minus the 86 point lead that he already has) and he can accomplish that in a few different way. If Johnson finishes any better than 18th place he owns the title (112 points for 17th). If Johnson leads at least one lap (which is highly likely since he starts on the pole) then 19th place would do it (106 points for 19th plus 5 for 1 lap lead). Or if Johnson were to somehow lead the most laps in the race and then fall somewhere back in the pack then 21st place would do it (100 points for 21st plus 5 for leading a lap and another 5 for leading the most laps). While it is obviously possible for Gordon to win the title, the question is does he have any realistic chance? I can tell you with some certainty that Jeff Gordon has a 2.9% chance of winning the title. A brief aside on probability: The probability of taking the ace out of [a suit of cards] is 1/13: now it being very plain that the taking or not taking the ace out of the first heap has no influence in the taking or not taking the ace out of the second;…those two events being independent the probability of their both happening will be 1/13 x 1/13 = 1/169 – Doctrine of Chance, Abraham de Moivre In plainer English what that means is that the odds of Gordon winning the title can best be expressed as the odds of Gordon doing really well multiplied by the odds of Jimmie Johnson laying an egg. Thomas Bayes would later provide later more insight as to how you can more accurately determine the odds of each independent event but let’s face it I’m not that educated so let’s stick to simple probability. Jeff Gordon has won 6 of 35 events this year netting him at least 190 points in each race, so the odds of him doing really well can be represented as 6/35 or .1714. Coincidentally, Jimmie Johnson has performed poorly in 6 of 35 events netting him 100 points or less (again 6/35 or .1714). Obviously the combination of these two events would allow Gordon to make up his 86 point gap and win the title (probability of A times probability of B equals probability of both). .1714 x .1714 = .0293 So like I said, there is a 2.9 % chance of Gordon winning the title (who says NASCAR fans are a bunch of backwoods hicks). For anyone who doesn’t find math the least bit interesting, you’re probably asleep by now. When you wake up you may be interested in knowing that if there is a crazy big crash involving Jimmie Johnson then this Gordon guy has a pretty good shot at winning the title since he drives so fast and all. Gordon and Johnson are the class of the current NASCAR crop and with Gordon 36 years old and Johnson just 32 these two drivers could easily go at it for another ten years. Talent is certainly not a problem and as both drivers race for the deep-pocketed Hendrick Motorsports having the latest technology and equipment is par for the course. Only in NASCAR can you have a rivalry where the rivals are on the same team. Anything can happen in a NASCAR race. Low percentages don’t necessarily mean impossible odds because as I like to point out at 190 miles per hour anything can happen. If Tim Duncan accidentally runs in to the goalpost in game seven of the NBA finals it would not negate a 35 point lead for the Spurs. Jimmie Johnson doesn’t have that luxury. One wrong turn, one bad pass by a rookie long out of contention, or one catastrophic error on pit row can undo an entire season of work. Or as the ESPN promos say every lap counts. In the Chase for the Nextel Cup perhaps more so than in any other sport it truly isn’t over until the fat lady sings. People who think that NASCAR is a backwoods sport not worthy of watching can reach me via email at kyrilmitch_76@yahoo.com with concerns, comments and complaints. Information on Abraham de Moivre and Thomas Bayes was found in Probability and Statistics by John Tabak Ph. D.

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