Tuesday 22 July at 15:00 : Mark Webber has slammed formula one's current safety car rules as "a joke".

Struggling Renault rookie Nelson Piquet secured his debut podium at Hockenheim last Sunday, but Australian Webber, 31, dismissed the result as "bizarre".

"I think the rules are a joke," he wrote in his latest column for the BBC.

Webber said he was happy for newcomer Piquet, but said formula one is "more professional and better" than for a bad set of rules to throw up such strange results.

"It looks very amateurish when the guy who nearly wins the race starts 17th and only overtakes one car, Kazuki Nakajima's Williams, because he spun. For me, that is not what formula one is all about," Webber said.

There have been efforts to reshape the current safety car rules, but Webber said the teams and the FIA are "making heavy weather" of the change.