Jenson Button - Brawn GP Team - Australia 2009
The first Formula One Grand Prix of the season got underway yesterday and what a fantastic result for the brand new Brawn GP team.
As Jenson Button got a great start from the off, Rubens Barrichello didn’t appear to have noticed that the race had started but soon had his sights set on the job ahead.
At the first turn Mark Webber in the Red Bull appeared to turn-in on Barrichello. The BMW Sauber of Nick Heidfeld, the McLaren of Heikki Kovalainen and Adrain Sutil in the Force India car were also collected in the clash. Heidfeld came into the pits with a rear right puncture, Webber came in for a for a new front wing while Kovalainen’s car limped around the circuit before he retired from the race.
Britain’s Jenson Button led the 58-lap Melbourne GP from pole position pulling away from the rest of the pack and continued to make progress until lap 19 when the safety car was deployed after Williams driver Kazuki Nakajima hit the wall on exiting turn 4.
The McLaren of Lewis Hamilton had now moved into 11th place after qualifying in 18th, he benefited from the incident at the first corner and also by being one of the first to pit and refuel, taking on new prime tyres.
Williams driver Nico Rosberg, looked to be in with a podium finish until a very slow pit stop after a problem with the the left front wheel and then the FW31 developed a problem late on in the race seeing him fall back into seventh place.
On lap 25, Renault driver Nelson Piquet went off into the gravel after locking his brakes and spinning the car leading to his retirement, while his team-mate Fernando Alonso finally finished in sixth place.
Felipe Massa and fellow Ferrari driver Kimi Raikkonen had a relatively quiet day with neither driver finishing the race and no points for the team. Massa retired his car on lap 47 after developing a mechanical problem and Raikkonen who had previously made contact with a retaining wall retired after his final pit stop while under the safety car.
Rookie driver Sebastien Buemi in the Toro Rosso finished in seventh place earning his team some valuable points on his first outing, while his team-mate Sebastien Bourdais finished in eighth.
Barrichello didn’t have it quite so easy and was behind Sebastian Vettel in the Red Bull and Robert Kubica in the BMW Sauber. Kubica began to put pressure on Vettel as his tyres improved but on lap 55 with only 3 laps left to run, Kubica was alongside Vettel when the two made contact, spinning them both. Vettel minus a front wing tried to continue but crashed out almost immediately while Kubica did the same a little later, once again deploying the safety car.
After the race it was declared that Sebastian Vettel and the Red Bull team would be penalised for the crash with Kubica and he was handed a ten-grid penalty for the next round of the championship in Malaysia next week. The team were also fined $50,000 after it emerged that members of the team had radioed Vettel and instructing him to continue driving on three-wheels rather than retire his car.
A disappointing day for the Toyota team after third placed man Jarno Trulli had his position put back to twelfth after stewards decided that he illegally overtook Hamilton under the safety car. The team are appealing the decision after Trulli explained that he had no choice but to overtake as Hamilton had slowed down leaving him to think he had a problem. Both Toyota drivers had started from the pit lane after being excluded from the afternoon qualifying session where Timo Glock had finished in sixth and Trulli in eighth.
In a post qualifying inspection it was discovered that the TF109 contravened the the FIA technical regulations with their new rear wing. The wing was deemed to be too flexible and the team agreed to modify the part overnight. Not a great result for the Toyota team but an added bonus for the McLaren team and Hamilton who is now placed in third place.
Here are the results;
Classified: Pos Driver Team Time 1. Button Brawn GP (B) 1h34:15.784 2. Barrichello Brawn GP (B) + 0.807 3. Trulli Toyota (B) + 1.604 4. Hamilton McLaren-Mercedes (B) + 2.914 5. Glock Toyota (B) + 4.435 6. Alonso Renault (B) + 4.879 7. Rosberg Williams-Toyota (B) + 5.722 8. Buemi Toro Rosso-Ferrari (B) + 6.004 9. Bourdais Toro Rosso-Ferrari (B) + 6.298 10. Sutil Force India-Mercedes (B) + 6.335 11. Heidfeld BMW Sauber (B) + 7.085 12. Fisichella Force India-Mercedes (B) + 7.374 13. Webber Red Bull-Renault (B) + 1 lap 14. Vettel Red Bull-Renault (B) + 2 laps 15. Kubica BMW Sauber (B) + 3 laps 16. Raikkonen Ferrari (B) + 3 laps Fastest lap: Rosberg, 1:27.706 Not classified/retirements: Driver Team On lap Massa Ferrari (B) 46 Piquet Renault (B) 25 Nakajima Williams-Toyota (B) 18 Kovalainen McLaren-Mercedes (B) 1
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