Lewis Hamilton streaked around the Bahrain circuit faster than any man in history but that did not entirely cheer those in the grandstands who cared about the wider health of Formula One.

Take Bernie Ecclestone’s word for that. Sitting in his paddock hospitality before qualifying, he asked: ‘What am I going to sit in the bloody grandstand for, with my wife and two kids? Or somebody else’s wife. To see what?’

The sad fact is that reprising the new, elimination-themed qualifying system that was mocked from Melbourne to Marlow when it was introduced a fortnight ago was so obviously a folly that the only Nobel Prize that F1’s rulers could hope to win would be for obstinacy.

Bernie Ecclestone, chief executive of the Formula One, was in attendance for qualifying in Bahrain

The hope is that the factions who are due to meet here on Monday — Ecclestone, the FIA president Jean Todt and the teams — will finally jettison the scheme and revert to the tried and trusted system that was popular for the previous 10 years. Unanimity, hardly F1’s middle name, is needed for that to happen.

The story of Saturday’s qualifying is that, for the last three minutes, not so much as a wheel turned, other than to take cars into the pits. By then, Hamilton had produced an exocet-quick time from almost nowhere.

It was his 51st career pole, though he had a scare when stewards asked him to explain why he reversed in the pit lane at the end of qualifying. He had travelled back little more than a foot and rightly escaped with a reprimand.

Lewis Hamilton (righ) addresses the media having just pipped his team-mate Nico Rosberg to pole position

Hamilton described his pole time as a 'sexy lap' and pats his Mercedes car after the session's conclusion

Before his blistering lap, Nico Rosberg appeared to be in charge, while Hamilton overstretched at the last corner of his penultimate lap and ran wide.

Hamilton’s next time of 1min 29.493 was a record. Rosberg was second quickest and Sebastian Vettel, of Ferrari, third.

But fans were left to look at a blank track all too often. Towards the end of each session drivers were not only out of their cars but out of their helmets while time remained on the clock, choosing to conserve their tyres for Monday’s race instead of trying to bang in a faster lap. It had been a political day in the paddock, this sport being sure to atone for its on-track failings with machinations off it.

Ecclestone called in the journalists and hit out at the drivers who wrote a letter expressing their disquiet with the sport. The correspondence contained no specifics, or an outline of strategy, or well-aimed criticism.

‘What interest do drivers have apart from taking money out of the sport?’ he said. ‘I’ve never seen one put a single dollar in. You go for dinner with them and they don’t even pay the bill. They shouldn’t even be allowed to talk. They should get in the car and drive it.

‘Maybe what we should do is that the FIA should write the regulations and ask the teams if they want to enter the championship. We shouldn’t ask their opinion; just ask them if they want to enter.’

Stoffel Vandoorne, who replaces the injured Fernando Alonso for this race, qualified 12th — a 10th of a second ahead of his team-mate Jenson Button, in 14th.