Grand Prix kingpin Bernie Ecclestone, one of Europe’s wealthiest business tycoons, has sensationally turned down a chance to buy back Formula One.

The 85-year-old who sold F1 to private equity company CVC 11 years ago, but was retained as head honcho of the sport, was offered the chance to take over in a top-secret get-together but faced with an asking price of billions of dollars he spurned the opportunity.

We lunched together last Monday and he was in an amazingly revealing mood over his plate of spaghetti — and he was even more informative and plain-speaking about a rebuffed plan to recruit helpmates to ease his increasingly onerous burden of work.

The question he always faces, and fends off, is when will he quit and who would assume the mantle of Formula One master? And the closest he has ever come to hinting beyond his ever-so-tight-lips that he could be counting the days came during the main course at our regular London dining venue.

We have been close friends, confidantes and allies for 40 years and I have never known him be so revealing about his supreme situation as the unchallenged and much-revered supremo of the sport that right now is worth some $10 billion (Dh36.7 billion) with an annual rake in of $1.6 billion.

It was my question...Would you ever think of buying back F1?...that triggered an instant response: ”No way. No thanks. Not at all. It would be too difficult and far too complicated. I am quite happy the share holding I have. I would either want to buy more or less all the other shares so there would be no democracy. And I would not want that.”

He was reluctant to give his decision any added light and laughed off my increasing curiosity.

What he did seek, he further revealed, was somebody to share his mammoth workload but the names he suggested, possibly people who could have eventually replaced him, were rejected out of hand by the CVC hierarchy.

He told me: “The shareholders were desperate to see if they could get somebody to help me and in case something happened to me and I was not here to run the business.

“I’ve been looking for a few years and I would be really happy to have somebody who could share some of the responsibilities I face every hour of every day and ease the burden of some of the total rubbish I have to try and cope with every time I get behind my desk and let me get on with what is best for F1.

“There are a million people who think they can do it. And it is an urgent case of finding the right one. I am lucky enough to have been around long enough so I know most people who believe and rely on me. I know I can just pick up the phone and talk to them and they trust me.

“There are a couple of people I would be happy with and I put their names forward, people I would have been content and satisfied to have working with me to spread the load — but their names were dismissed.”

So who was on his list?

As I said he would not name names. But, ironically, when I suggested his big ally and greatest friend Flavio Briatore, a strong business associate and co-buyer of Queens Park Rangers football club, is a sad loss to F1, Bernie opened up again.

The flamboyant and mega-rich Italian, now the owner of the worldwide Billionaire Club collection of exclusive nightspots, and once a grand prix team chief, but booted out of F1 for underhand escapades, is still an enthusiastic attender at GPs, especially Monaco, where he berths his impressively large private yacht for party times to stir the memory of attendees for years to come.

“I would love Flavio to come back,” he revealed, “but there are blocks on him. And that is so sad and enforces a great loss to Formula One.

“He understands this business, and loves it despite what it has done to him, and so far as I am concerned he is the guy I most trust and so much so, I would trust him without a nanosecond of doubt with my blank chequebook with every cheque signed by me and not made out to a beneficiary.

“Not to have faith and belief in him is all nonsense. If I could overcome the suspicions of those who doubt him to the point of rejection it would be to my utter satisfaction. But there are those who will not have it.”

And he adds: ”But I don’t have time to sit and fret about the decisions of people in authority who disagree with my urgings. I don’t have the time to sit and moan.

“My view of life and business is simple and uncomplicated: do your utmost to make a success, stay involved — or get out.

“And, despite the setbacks, and my backing down from a buyout, I’m going nowhere.

“Well....not just yet.”