Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsMercedes

Dominance is bad for Mercedes - Ecclestone

Bernie Ecclestone says Mercedes' dominance is "not good for anyone" and needs to end this season to help F1 increase its appeal.

Mercedes has won the last two drivers' and constructors' championships with ease, with Lewis Hamilton wrapping up his second consecutive drivers' title with three races remaining in 2015 - one race later than the team had secured the constructors'. Stable regulations could lead to a repeat performance in 2016 but Ecclestone says even Mercedes is not benefitting from such dominance.

"No, that's not good for Mercedes," Ecclestone told Tiroler Tageszeitung. "That's not good for the public, which is not good for anyone. We hope that we have some really competitive teams at the start next season."

And Ecclestone admits he is pinning his hopes on Ferrari becoming more competitive in 2016 to challenge Mercedes.

"I hope [to increase the appeal] and that's why we really need [to hope] that Ferrari increased its competitiveness. That is a great difficulty for the other teams. We finally need someone who keeps up with Mercedes."

France's grand prix circuits

Force India winter diary part three - Sporting Director

1982 French GP: A French touch of clash...

Key dates for the 2016 F1 season

Keep up to date with all the F1 news via Facebook and Twitter

Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.