My wife question my sanity when I woke up before 7am on Saturday morning to watch the F1 qualifying. “It’s only qualifying,” she said. After recovering from the shock of such a statement, I tried to explain the importance of qualifying in motorsports. She wasn’t bothered.

So Saturday morning arrived and I duly woke up early for qualifying. I was excited. The four-month wait was finally over, yeah!

Lights turned green and Hamilton set the ball rolling on the 2016 season. It was a great start, with a great deal of traffic and excitant. It didn’t last. The staggered exclusion is, on paper, a great idea. In reality, it sucks.

Firstly, some teams seemed not to realise that when the time ran out, the time ran out and that was that (like Haas F1, whose driver Grojean had a superb lap which was useless as he was already out).

The problem was that since it was a staggered elimination, drivers who were not directly affected chose not to bother after setting a good lap. Boring doesn’t even start to explain it. I found the ad breaks far more entertaining (thanks Renault, Clio looks great).

However, the worst part came at the end where drivers simply gave up / were not interested / couldn’t be bothered to take to the lap. Once Hamilton set a pole-winning lap, everyone just got out of their cars and went wherever it is that drivers go after qualifying.

The Swiss TV presenter seemed a bit shocked at the fact that with more than 2 minutes remaining, it was all over. Even Hamilton looked somewhat confused.

Now, let’s be fair to the FIA. Their aim was to improve the sport. This measure obviously didn’t work. To avoid criticism, they should revert to the old system or introduce something else for Bahrain. But please, FIA, don’t keep this qualifying format – it’s terrible.