Ecclestone Urges Ferrari's Rivals to Improve

Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone believes the Australian Grand Prix two weeks ago served as a wake up call for Ferrari's rivals and said that handicapping Ferrari is not the solution to improve the show.

The Italian team took the Formula One paddock by surprise in the opening round of the 2004 season, when World Champion Michael Schumacher and his Ferrari teammate Rubens Barrichello scored an easy 1-2 result in the race, after dominating every session throughout the weekend. Ecclestone says the result was not what he had expected.

"We have to wait and see whether Melbourne was a freak or not," Ecclestone told The Daily Telegraph. "It's too soon to judge. Ferrari were just ready straight out of the box. I think it's all right. The other teams have had a wake-up call, that's all.

"I think they really thought that Ferrari wouldn't perform like that for various reasons, mostly because the Bridgestone tyres weren't getting the job done in the winter, but we were all wrong. Ferrari did get the job done as usual."

However Ecclestone was against finding rules that would handicap Ferrari and tighten competition, saying the right way to do that is to allow Ferrari's rivals to improve. "It's really nothing to do with Ferrari winning, it's about the others losing," Ecclestone said.

"You can't handicap Ferrari and I don't think any other competitive team would want that to happen. If you asked Ron Dennis or Frank Williams if they'd like that, they'd say no."

Ecclestone remained critical of the existing qualifying format but said changes were not up to him, a fact he regrets. "I can't impose my will because we're a democracy. Unfortunately," he told the newspaper. "When I started F1 in the old days it used to be run a little bit more as a dictatorship. It was always: 'Be reasonable. Do it my way.' And now we've become a 'democracy'.

"And it's even worse than that. A lot of regulations require a unanimous vote to change them. So it's difficult to get change at all."