JULY 5, 2005

Now Webber rails against the rules

Mark Webber has launched an attack on F1's qualifying format because he says he had to suffer burns into order to finish the French Grand Prix so as to avoid running early in the qualifying session at the next race.

Webber was being burned throughout the race by hot air, which was leaking into the cockpit from the engine bay. At one point when he pitted the team dumped a bucket of water onto Webber to try to ease the pain. At the end of the race Webber had treatment for the burn.

"It was bloody agony,'' the Australian told the Herald Sun newspaper in Melbourne. ''If if wasn't for this f**king qualifying we have got, I would have stopped.''

Webber says that despite the damage done he will be racing at Silverstone.