Bernie Ecclestone cut a frustrated figure on Friday.<\/p>\n
Speaking to reporters in Malaysia, the F1 supremo refused to accept the blame for the axe of the German grand prix.<\/p>\n
The 84-year-old said organisers simply would not pay the right price.<\/p>\n
“It’s funny how these people dig up all this money for things like the Olympics, swimming championships, European athletics and god knows what else,” he said.<\/p>\n
And historic Monza, he warned, could be next, even though it is another of the iconic yet dwindling European hosts on the calendar.<\/p>\n
“There are lots of things we would like,” said Ecclestone, “but we don’t have them because we can’t afford them.<\/p>\n
“What goes, goes,” he added.<\/p>\n
Ecclestone even suggested that Germany’s return to the calendar next year is not certain, even though Hockenheim has a contract.<\/p>\n
“I have learned over time that contracts are often not worth their paper,” he is quoted by Auto Bild.<\/p>\n
The sport’s diminutive chief executive also criticised his old favourite Sebastian Vettel, hailing Lewis Hamilton as the “best world champion we’ve ever had”.<\/p>\n
“Lewis is a good ambassador,” Ecclestone is quoted by Auto Motor und Sport.<\/p>\n
“Some others, Vettel included, believe their only job is to drive a car fast.”<\/p>\n
Ecclestone is most frustrated, however, with the very state of his formula one ‘show’, and the fact today’s democratic procedures means his hands are tied.<\/p>\n
“I know what to do, but I can do nothing,” he said.<\/p>\n
He said he watched the Melbourne season opener on television in London, and recoiled at the diminished 15-car grid, remarking “This is supposed to be a race!”<\/p>\n
But he doesn’t blame dominant Mercedes.<\/p>\n
“They have done a better job than the others and so they deserve to be successful,” said Ecclestone.<\/p>\n
As for the actual ‘show’, however: “For years we have just repaired an old house, and I’m disappointed and frustrated that it’s come to this.<\/p>\n
“We need new rules,” said Ecclestone, “but the teams would have to agree.\u00a0 But they only will if it doesn’t damage their own interests.”<\/p>\n
At the very least, he is hoping a majority vote will push through substantial changes for 2017.<\/p>\n
“This has to happen in the next two months,” said the Briton.<\/p>\n
But he admitted his best ideas, including low-cost customer teams and radical qualifying formats, are unlikely to proceed.<\/p>\n
“If we assigned the same points for qualifying as we do for the race, but the fastest driver has to then start from 12th, the race would definitely be interesting,” said Ecclestone.<\/p>\n
He also backs Red Bull’s idea of a wind tunnel ban, and said he would go one step further, also banning telemetry.<\/p>\n
\u00a9 RIF | GMM<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Bernie Ecclestone cut a frustrated figure on Friday. Speaking to reporters in Malaysia, the F1 supremo refused to accept the blame for the axe of the German grand prix. The 84-year-old said organisers simply would not pay the right price. “It’s funny how these people dig up all this money for things like the Olympics, …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23046,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,5262,5340,1548,154,1178,5107,164],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28400"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28400"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28400\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28401,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28400\/revisions\/28401"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28400"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28400"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racinginfocus.com\/rif\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28400"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}