Marko urges F1 to act at meeting next week

May 9 (GMM) Dr Helmut Marko has launched a new stinging attack on the current F1 regulations, urging the sport to act during a crunch meeting next week.

Lead Red Bull driver Daniel Ricciardo struck even more Renault engine trouble in Barcelona practice, meaning the team could not fully evaluate its major new aerodynamic package including a radically-short nose.

Referring to the rules, Marko told Austria's APA news agency: "It makes our work impossible to prepare for the race in a professional way."

The Austrian official is equally frustrated with Red Bull's engine partner Renault, who are currently having to focus simply on getting to the bottom of its reliability problems.

But Marko said: "Reliability alone would not help us, as we are falling behind.

"What we lose with the engine we can more or less compensate by developing the chassis. But in the end we would rather be third and the engine blows than finish sixth or eighth," he charged.

Next week, the powerful Strategy Group will get together for a crunch meeting, and near the top of the agenda will be a proposal to add a fifth engine to each driver's 2015 allocation.

But Marko said: "For us it doesn't matter -- we need seven or eight.

"The (long life engine) rules are absurd because they do not reduce costs -- on the contrary. No one will finish the season on their fourth engine," he claimed.

Marko urged the Strategy Group to act urgently and reform the rules for 2017, even though many top teams are opposed to the idea of radical change.

"I hope something reasonable comes out of the meeting," he said.

"It is important not only for us but for the whole of formula one. TV ratings and crowds are down; there are hardly any new sponsors.

"Our boss (Dietrich Mateschitz) has already indicated that we will need to rethink our engagement if something does not change," Marko added.

He pointed the finger at the current mechanisms for change.

"The system with the FIA, FOM and the teams does not work," Marko charged. "You cannot always ask everybody what they want -- there should be an independent mechanism."