Concerns for Formula 1 after procession in Bahrain

After the opening race of the new Formula 1 season was widely panned as an underwhelming procession Bernie Ecclestone has questioned the wisdom of letting the racing technicians dicate the rules.

With the return of Michael Schumacher and four world champions lining up on the grid at the weekend, expectations of the new F1 season were high, but the race turned out to be a damp squib with few chances to overtake.

Several drivers, including Schumacher, reigning world champion Jenson Button and his McLaren team mate Lewis Hamilton subsequently questioned the new rules, which prevent refuelling during the race and require all drivers to change their tyres once.

The result was that most drivers stopped at the same time and then continued to the end of the race, which meant there was no room for race strategy to play a part. That turning the Bahrain Grand Prix into a 'train'. There are now fears that the reliability of the cars will be the main factor this year, rather than the ability of the drivers.

Former driver David Coulthard wrote in the Telegraph: "For me the performance of the weekend went to Jonathan Legard and Martin Brundle for managing to keep up a constant patter during the BBC coverage of what was a desperately underwhelming curtain-raiser for the 2010 season."

Ecclestone, the F1 commercial rights holder, who has a track record of proposing radical changes to the sport, including the idea of shortcuts, raised earlier this year, appeared to agree. "I had a meeting with the teams and tried to explain to them what our business is about - racing and entertaining the public, not about playing with computers and going fast over one lap," he told the Times.

"The problem is that you cannot really have teams in any shape or form having a part in the sporting or technical regulations. You cannot have the inmates writing the regulations."

However he dismissed the idea that the sport was in crisis already, and another former champion Jaques Villeneuve called for calm. The Canadian, who won the title in 1997 said: "One race doesn't mean anything. The worst thing would be for sudden changes before everybody is sure what they want."

However, there was even some concern from the teams. Martin Whitmarsh, the McLaren team principal backed the idea of two mandatory pit stops as it would lead to a more tactical race strategy. He suggested that tyre manufacturer Bridgestone should develop a product that degrades quickly to add an element of drama. "We need a super-soft tyre that is really going to hurt if you take it to 20 laps. Formula One has to be entertaining," he said. ·