Bernie Ecclestone has had much on his plate in recent weeks but, even by Formula One’s standards, a meeting at his London office last week was unusual. The Times can reveal that two team principals got so hot under the collar about money that they claim he owes them that they threatened to organise a boycott of the opening race of the season in Melbourne on Sunday.

In the confrontation, Flavio Briatore and Ron Dennis, the team principal of Renault and the chairman of McLaren Mercedes respectively, allegedly told Ecclestone that they would not put their cars on the specially chartered freight planes last Sunday if the billionaire did not write them a cheque. And, according to Ecclestone, they said that other members of the Formula One Teams Association (Fota) would follow suit.

A leaked account of the meeting, which was also attended by John Howett, the team principal of Toyota and the vice-president of Fota, was confirmed in detail by Ecclestone yesterday. The dispute was about money that Ecclestone has agreed to pay the teams, but only after they sign the next Concorde Agreement under which they agree to race, something they have so far failed to do.

“Flavio said, ‘we’re not going to put our cars on the plane, we’re not going to Melbourne,’ ” Ecclestone said. “He — Flavio — started it, aided and abetted by Ron Dennis.” The apparent threat to wreck the start of the Formula One season was countered by a classic Ecclestone ploy. “I picked up the phone to our people that handle all the freight to ask them to cancel the aeroplanes,” the billionaire said. “They were saying, ‘all the Fota-schmota are not going — nobody’s going to go.’ So I said what I’d better do is cancel the aircraft obviously. It costs a fortune to charter those things and almost as much to cancel them.”

The manoeuvre seems to have settled the matter because the Renault and McLaren cars have arrived in Australia, but neither Briatore nor Dennis got their money, which would have been a substantial sum.

Howett is not thought to have joined in with the others and Ecclestone observed: “Poor John was sitting there a bit confused about life in general.” Ecclestone does not mind, in the least, people coming in and threatening this or that, but he said he hates it when they then fail to deliver. “If they come in here with a gun and hold it to my head, they had better be sure they can f***ing pull the trigger,” he said. “And they should make sure it’s got bullets in it because, if they miss, they better look out.”

In Italy, Stefano Domenicali, the Ferrari team principal, has urged the FIA to clarify the legality of the diffusers at the rear of the Brawn GP, Toyota and Williams cars. Domenicali is convinced that the cars are illegal and he wants a ruling on the matter before protests from his and other teams are issued in Melbourne.