Brawn GP Button wins Turkish F1 Grand Prix
Jenson Button made it six wins out of seven races by claiming the Turkish Grand Prix in Istanbul. With his teammate Rubens Barrichello failing to score, Button now carries a 26-point lead into his home race at Silverstone in two weeks.
Sebastian Vettel had beat Button for the pole position, and the German driver seemed to have a good chance of stopping the Brawn steamroller and scoring the first dry-track win of his career. Vettel did the difficult part by beating Button off the line at the start, but later in the lap he ran wide. He did a good job to regain control, but Button snuck through and led at the end of the lap.
Vettel was on a three-stop strategy, and that error was the last thing he wanted. In the end his strategy failed to work for him, and he had to settle for third place behind Webber, who ran a very strong race on a two-stop plan but was almost 20s behind Button until the latter eased off in the closing stages. The Brawn driver eventually finished 6.7 seconds ahead, as Vettel hitched on to Webber’s bumper to finish 0.7 seconds adrift. The race was dominated by these three drivers.
Toyota’s Jarno Trulli and Williams’ Nico Rosberg had a race long battle for fourth which went the Italian’s way, while Felipe Massa’s hopes of a fourth straight victory here in the Ferrari were clearly unrealistic and he had to be satisfied with a distant sixth place ahead of the battling BMW Sauber’s Robert Kubica and Toyota’s Timo Glock.
Kimi Raikkonen was one of many stars to have an unrewarding afternoon. He brought his Ferrari home ninth ahead of Fernando Alonso’s Renault, the Spaniard separated from McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton by BMW Sauber’s Nick Heidfeld and Williams’ Kazuki Nakajima. Hamilton avoided being lapped only because Button backed off.
In a poor day for McLaren Heikki Kovalainen was 14th, a lap down, and led home Toro Rosso’s Sebastien Buemi, Renault’s Nelson Piquet, Force India’s Adrian Sutil and Sebastien Bourdais in the second Toro Rosso.
Barrichello had a miserable afternoon which included a spin after a brush with Kovalainen and nose damage after a collision with Sutil, and retired after 47 laps. Force India’s Giancarlo Fisichella went out earlier than that with mechanical gremlins, after four laps.
Button now has 61 points over Barrichello on 35, Vettel on 29 and Webber on 27.5. Brawn have 96 points to Red Bull’s 56.5.
RESULTS
1. Button Brawn GP-Mercedes
2. Webber Red Bull-Renault
3. Vettel Red Bull-Renault
4. Trulli Toyota
5. Rosberg Williams-Toyota
6. Massa Ferrari
7. Kubica BMW Sauber
8. Glock Toyota
9. Raikkonen Ferrari
10. Alonso Renault
11. Heidfeld BMW Sauber
12. Nakajima Williams-Toyota
13. Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes
14. Kovalainen McLaren-Mercedes
15. Buemi Toro Rosso-Ferrari
16. Piquet Renault
17. Sutil Force India-Mercedes
18. Bourdais Toro Rosso-Ferrari
POINTS TO DATE
1. Button 61
2. Barrichello 35
3. Vettel 29
4. Webber 27.5
5. Trulli 19.5
6. Glock 13
7. Rosberg 11.5
8. Massa 11
9. Alonso 11
10. Hamilton 9
11. Raikkonen 9
12. Heidfeld 6
13. Kovalainen 4
14. Buemi 3
15. Kubica 2
16. Bourdais 2
CONSTRUCTOR POINTS TO DATE
1. Brawn GP-Mercedes 96
2. Red Bull-Renault 56.5
3. Toyota 32.5
4. Ferrari 20
5. McLaren-Mercedes 13
6. Williams-Toyota 11.5
7. Renault 11
8. BMW Sauber 8
9. Toro Rosso-Ferrari 5