Thrilling Bahrain's Grand Prix offers perfect defense of new F1 rules

The new, revamped Formula One finally hit its stride, with Sunday’s Bahrain Grand Prix serving up one of the most thrilling races in recent memory just hours after all the off-track clamour criticizing the sport’s new rules had threatened to drown out the action on track.

The build-up to the race had been dominated by talk of a meeting between Ferrari president Luca di Montezemolo, Bernie Ecclestone and FIA president Jean Todt to discuss the impact of the new rules.

Ecclestone and Montezemolo, two of the most influential figures in Formula One, have been extremely vocal in their criticism of the sport’s new era. The Ferrari president has dismissed the racing this year as taxi-cab driving and, speaking to reporters ahead of Sunday’s race, the Italian stood by what he said.

“We cannot have a Formula One that is energy, fuel, economy formula,” Montezemolo told reporters in the Sakhir paddock, hours before the start of the race.

“The public doesn’t like a taxi driver that has to respect the fuel. This is not Formula One.”

Ecclestone, too, told reporters that Formula One in its current form was unacceptable to fans.

“We have to (change), for sure,” the sport’s ringmaster said. “I don’t think the way things are at the moment are acceptable to the public,” he said. “People buying tickets to come here, or go somewhere else, are expecting to see what Formula One used to be.” After two less-than-thrilling races and all indications pointing to another Mercedes walkover under the floodlights at the Sakhir circuit, the off-track politicking once again threatened to reduce Sunday’s race to a sub-plot to the jibber-jabber that goes on in the paddock.

But as it happened, Formula One couldn’t have picked a better time to silence the detractors and the race served as a ringing endorsement for the sport’s new rules. There was wheel-to-wheel racing throughout the field, with some great battles between Force India, Williams and Red Bull. And while the two Mercedes did indeed run away at the front, the battle for the lead between Hamilton and Rosberg was without a doubt the highlight of the race.

The two were at it as soon as the lights went off, Hamilton getting the better start from second. Rosberg came back at him down the long straight out of the second corner but Hamilton fended him off through the tight turn three.

All race long Rosberg, clearly the faster of the two Mercedes, attacked, attacked, attacked. But Hamilton defended beautifully.

He realized the futility of keeping the faster DRS-aided Silver Arrow behind on the straights and let Rosberg have the inside line under braking for the corners before cutting back across to the apex so he could get on the power early and outdrag his team-mate down another long straight.

A late-race safety car kept the battle alive until the very end of the race with the two Mercedes – for the most part separated by less than a second – trading fastest laps well into the dying stages of the grand prix.

Neither driver gave an inch and it must have made for nervous viewing on the pitwall. But all credit to Mercedes for not calling off the fight which offered us the first real glimpse of the levels of intensity a title battle between the two could take on, as the old go-kart sparring partners renew their rivalry at the very top of the motor-racing ladder.

“In that race we were both on the knife-edge,” Hamilton explained afterwards. “When you’re on the knife-edge the risk increases so, undoubtedly, we were on the limit and maybe next time we’ll come back a little bit.”

“But I was not letting it up today. He was doing a 100 (percent) so I had to go to 100. I can’t be 95 and then him a 100.”

“But I think he drove fantastically well, he was fair, and I’d like to think I was. It was close but we didn’t damage each other’s races which was really… the team put that trust in us which was great.”

Now, whether we will get just as exciting a race in China in two weeks time is hard to tell. But what Formula One’s timely response to its critics does is it proves that the new rules don’t take anything away from the sport’s spectacle.

There have always been exciting races in Formula One and equally there have always been dull, processional races as well. So, in the future if we get the occasional procession, we can’t conveniently pin the blame on the new rules.

“You’re always going to have some races that are incredibly exciting and some that are a little bit processional,” Force India team-principal Bob Fernley said after the race. “That’s the nature of what we do.”

“But when you get a race like this, it justifies everything. You’ve not had a race like this for a long time. And that’s a testament to the new rules.”