The complete European GP review

PRACTICE

Practice 1 - Friday AM

Soaring track temperatures and a better understanding of the tyre issues Brawn had suffered in the previous three races allowed Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello to shine on the dusty Valencia street track.

Ultimately it was the Brazilian who set the fastest time as the championship leader struggled to find a satisfactory set-up, moving from understeer to oversteer with unhappy abandon.

McLaren's Heikki Kovalainen and team-mate Lewis Hamilton, driving a new short-wheelbase version of the improving MP4-24, pushed the Briton down to fourth.

Further back, Luca Badoer began a difficult a re-acclimatisation with the harsh competitive realities of Formula 1. There were few mistakes, but by the flag the Italian Ferrari substitute was 3.380s away from Barrichello's pace, and more than two slower than Kimi Raikkonen in the Scuderia's sister car.

Practice 2 - Friday PM

Fernando Alonso delivered a crowd-pleasing performance to set the pace, despite a collision with Nick Heidfeld and a late-session spin. Later the Renault driver would claim that while the time was real, rather than fuel-assisted, he believed it was not enough to challenge the title contenders.

The Brawns confirmed their morning promise as the track temperature moved beyond 50 degrees C and placed the BGP001s into their primary operating window. This time Button out-gunned Barrichello in second and third.

Nico Rosberg and Kazuki Nakajima deliver Williams its usual Friday free practice boon while Adrian Sutil proved the significant modifications introduced to the Force India for Valencia were indeed an improvement.

Badoer continued to struggle, and to add to his woes he collected 5,400 Euros worth of fines, after notching up a record four speeding offences in the pits.

Saturday Practice

Saturday practice was marked by the mechanical failure suffered by championship hopeful Sebastian Vettel, whose Red Bull car's oil lubricated the circuit enough for the session to be red-flagged for more than 25 minutes, thus shortening it significantly.

As a result of that, no driver managed more than 14 laps ahead of qualifying. Vettel only completed six tours of the Spanish track on his way to the 18th quickest time.

A much happier Sutil emerged on top of the timesheets at the end of the 30 something-minute-long session, the Force India driver continuing to show good progress. The unusual top three was completed by Nakajima in the Williams and Kubica in the BMW Sauber.

The main contenders were far from the top, with Button in seventh ahead of Hamilton.

QUALIFYING

1. Lewis Hamilton - McLaren-Mercedes

Making it very clear that McLaren's Hungary showing was no one-off, Hamilton looked strong right from the start of the weekend despite missing most of the second practice session. Using a car with a shorter wheelbase for the first time, Hamilton shot to the top of the times in Q3 with his first flying lap, aborting his final run when it was clear that pole was his.

2. Heikki Kovalainen - McLaren-Mercedes

Having been told to raise his game if he wants a new contract, Kovalainen put on one of his strongest qualifying performances of the season. The Finn looked to have a shot at pole until he made a mistake at the end of his final run. Though it seemed that Hamilton might have bettered that if required to.

3. Rubens Barrichello - Brawn-Mercedes

After the problems of the last few races, Brawn seemed to step up its game in Valencia where the nature of the track, together with the very high temperatures, put the British squad back in a position to fight. Barrichello made good use of that and set the quickest time of the day in Q2. In Q3, the Brazilian was heavier than the McLarens and less than a tenth off pole.

4. Sebastian Vettel - Red Bull-Renault

Vettel recovered well after missing most of Saturday's practice session due to his engine problem, although the Red Bull driver conceded he was hoping to be closer to the top. Still, he managed to beat Button and Webber, although the pace of the McLarens suggested the German was not going to fight for victory on Sunday.

5. Jenson Button - Brawn-Mercedes

Having shown improved form from the start of the weekend, Button was pleased with his position, despite having being unable to fight for pole. The championship leader believed more was possible, but a mistake on his final run left him with no chance to improve any further.

6. Kimi Raikkonen - Ferrari

Despite qualifying on the third row of the grid, Raikkonen felt it had been one of the best sessions of the season for him. He conceded however that his chances of a strong result would depend a lot on the start. Nonetheless, things were smooth for the Finn and the result was probably the best possible given the pace of the Ferrari.

7. Nico Rosberg - Williams-Toyota

Rosberg put on the now usual consistent performance to be right in the mix come race day. Much to his credit, the Williams driver was the heaviest of the men in Q3, leaving him upbeat of a strong race. He admitted, however, that he was wary of the KERS-equipped cars.

8. Fernando Alonso - Renault

Having started the weekend in promising fashion by topping the times on Friday, the local hero was left disappointed with his performance on Saturday. Eighth place was far from ideal for Alonso, who was hoping to please his fans with a strong result. A problem with his brakes in Q3 did not help matters.

9. Mark Webber - Red Bull-Renault

Enduring one of his worst qualifying sessions for some time, Webber conceded he was expecting a difficult because it was evident the Red Bull was not the top car in Valencia. Even so, the Australian was hoping to be a row or two further up and, especially, not behind the two Brawns and Vettel.

10. Robert Kubica - BMW-Sauber

It was pretty clear from the start of the weekend that BMW's improved package had given the team a few extra tenths per lap. That, along with the fact that the F1.09 seemed better suited to the Valencia circuit, allowed Kubica to return to the top ten for the first time since Turkey.

11. Nick Heidfeld - BMW-Sauber

In a very tight qualifying session, Heidfeld missed the Q1 cut by less than a tenth of a second, meaning he would start from 11th place for the sixth time this season. The German found consolation in being able to choose his strategy freely and, given BMW's improved pace, he was hopeful of scoring points.

12. Adrian Sutil - Force India-Mercedes

Showing Force India continues to make progress towards the sharp end of the grid, Sutil grabbed the top spot in final practice and put himself in a promising position for qualifying. In the end he needed around a tenth to move into Q1, but P12 was a solid performance that left Sutil eyeing his first points of the year.

13. Timo Glock - Toyota

Complaining from a lack of grip, Glock and team-mate Trulli were never in contention for the top places in Saturday's grid-deciding session. Glock was not too far from reaching Q3, but his tyres did not hold for an entire lap, the German struggling to keep the rears intact in the final part of the circuit.

14. Romain Grosjean - Renault

There was not a lot of pressure on Grosjean on his first Formula 1 outing, as he replaced the struggling Piquet. Nonetheless, the Frenchman put on a solid effort and finished just three tenths of a second behind team-mate Alonso in Q2, suggesting there might be more to come as he get to grips with the Renault.

15. Sebastien Buemi - Toro Rosso-Ferrari

Although Buemi posted a promising sixth quickest time in Q1, the Swiss was nowhere near that effort in the second session. He admitted the team had managed the tyre situation wrongly and the Toro Rosso racer ended up being slower than in the first segment.

16. Giancarlo Fisichella - Force India-Mercedes

Overshadowed by his team-mate Sutil for most of the weekend, Fisichella had a difficult qualifying session and was unable to extract the best from the improving Force India car. The veteran Italian blamed traffic for not getting more out of the car on his first run, and his second outing was just not good enough to reach Q2.

17. Kazuki Nakajima - Williams-Toyota

Nakajima's day came to an early finish when his Williams suffered a problem and his engine which cut out before he managed to complete his final flying run. The disappointed Japanese said after the session that he felt his car was good enough for a place in the top ten.

18. Jarno Trulli - Toyota

Trulli admitted he was expected a tough qualifying session, but not even the Italian himself could have predicted such a struggle on Saturday. Suffering from a serious lack of grip, the Toyota driver was never a factor and failed to reach the second qualifying segment by quite a margin.

19. Jaime Alguersuari - Toro Rosso-Ferrari

Despite finishing a second behind team-mate Buemi, the Spaniard was happy with his performance, as he felt the gap to the rest of the cars was smaller than in his first outing in Hungary. Alguersuari made no significant mistakes for the second weekend in a row, although the pace of the Toro Rosso at Valencia didn't seem as strong as in Hungary.

20. Luca Badoer - Ferrari

It was far from an easy weekend for the Italian, who struggled to get to grips with his car right from the start of practice. It was hardly a surprise given his lack of running, but even so, three seconds off the pace was probably even worse than he and Ferrari had expected. Things should be better at Spa.
Team-by-team

QUALIFYING RESULTS
Pos  Driver       Team                       Q1        Q2        Q3     
 1.  Hamilton     McLaren-Mercedes      (B)  1:38.649  1:38.182  1:39.498
 2.  Kovalainen   McLaren-Mercedes      (B)  1:38.816  1:38.230  1:39.532
 3.  Barrichello  Brawn-Mercedes        (B)  1:39.019  1:38.076  1:39.563
 4.  Vettel       Red Bull-Renault      (B)  1:39.295  1:38.273  1:39.789
 5.  Button       Brawn-Mercedes        (B)  1:38.531  1:38.601  1:39.821
 6.  Raikkonen    Ferrari               (B)  1:38.843  1:38.782  1:40.144
 7.  Rosberg      Williams-Toyota       (B)  1:39.039  1:38.346  1:40.185
 8.  Alonso       Renault               (B)  1:39.155  1:38.717  1:40.236
 9.  Webber       Red Bull-Renault      (B)  1:38.983  1:38.625  1:40.239
10.  Kubica       BMW-Sauber            (B)  1:38.806  1:38.747  1:40.512
11.  Heidfeld     BMW-Sauber            (B)  1:39.032  1:38.826
12.  Sutil        Force India-Mercedes  (B)  1:39.145  1:38.846
13.  Glock        Toyota                (B)  1:39.459  1:38.991
14.  Grosjean     Renault               (B)  1:39.322  1:39.040
15.  Buemi        Toro Rosso-Ferrari    (B)  1:38.912  1:39.514
16.  Fisichella   Force India-Mercedes  (B)  1:39.531
17.  Nakajima     Williams-Toyota       (B)  1:39.795
18.  Trulli       Toyota                (B)  1:39.807
19.  Alguersuari  Toro Rosso-Ferrari    (B)  1:39.925
20.  Badoer       Ferrari               (B)  1:41.413

All Timing Unofficial

THE RACE

Last year's inaugural European GP was hardly a gripper, and while this year's race was not exactly a thrill a minute spectacle, it was an intriguing event, and one that emphasised just how closely matched the teams are this year.

In the end Rubens Barrichello showed that Brawn GP's mid-season hiatus is over - or may be over - and he scored his first win since leaving Ferrari. A pitstop glitch for McLaren may have helped a little, and while we'll never know for sure if he would have won anyway, McLaren's mistake was a direct result of the intense pressure that Rubens was applying on Hamilton.

Having been close to the pace in Germany and won in Hungary, McLaren demonstrated its pace on yet another track when its two cars shut out the front row.

The fast sweeping corners of Spa are a different kind of challenge and the team may find life harder there, but there's no question that from here to the end of the season it will have the potential to win races. And that had added yet more spice to an already fascinating battle for the title.

For this race McLaren brought its short wheelbase update kit, and damage to the only available front wing restricted Hamilton's running on Friday. Because of that he didn't have enough knowledge in the bank to make a proper judgement about it on Friday night, so he stuck with it for Saturday. Although he took pole by the end of the day he was already talking about going back to standard for Spa.

In other words he went into Sunday thinking that Heikki Kovalainen might just have the better package for the race. But for a mistake the Finn would have been quicker, and fuel corrected, he was. To be fair to Lewis he did abort his last lap as he didn't have to respond.

But he knew he had to hold onto his advantage off the line, and he did exactly that. With their KERS buttons to play with the McLaren guys were unlikely to come under threat from Rubens, who started third. And indeed that consideration played a part in determining Brawn's strategy.

The team saw no point in going light to guarantee pole only to lose out to KERS boost anyway, so it erred towards a heavier load hoping that it would pay off at the pit stops. It didn't quite work out for Jenson Button as he made a mistake and only took fifth, but things worked perfectly for Rubens as he took third.

He was confident even before the weights were published that he was heavier, and so it proved. He could plan his race around the knowledge that he could run three or four laps further than Hamilton, and two or three more than Kovalainen.

McLaren was well aware of that, so the drivers knew that they had to escape from the Brawn, or hope that Sebastian Vettel got in front of Barrichello and made life harder for him. McLaren made the interesting choice to start on the super soft tyre, as did Ferrari and BMW. The rest thought that the soft would be a better bet for the opening stint.

The early laps suggested that McLaren had got its sums right.

Hamilton soon began opening up a gap on Kovalainen, extending it to 5.7s within 10 laps. Barrichello sat around 1.7-2.0s behind the Finn, a gap that was mirrored pretty much down the field as it as close as you can stay to the car ahead at this peculiar track without your tyres or overall performance starting to suffer.

Barrichello knew that was close enough to be able to deal with Kovalainen, although he must have been concerned that Hamilton would get too far ahead. Of course McLaren could have asked Kovalainen to back off and give Lewis breathing space, and such things have often happened in the past, but as Martin Whitmarsh insisted, the team lets it drivers race.

Hamilton came in on lap 16 and Kovalainen a lap later. In clear air, Barrichello had to put in three mega laps, and he did just that. With a heavy car Kovalainen was a sitting duck, and the Brawn made the pass easily.

Now Barrichello had the whole of his middle stint to reel in Hamilton. This was an interesting battle, not least because both men stayed with their initial choice of tyres - super softs for Hamilton, softs for Rubens - to be used over stints of identical length. Which one would prove to be the best choice as more rubber went down and the track's characteristics changed?

Barrichello has had some very frustrating races this year, spoiled by odd stints where the tyres didn't suit him and he just didn't do the lap times that he needed to. This time he was on it. On lap 21 the margin was 3.1s, and a few laps into the stint in drifted out to 4.5s. But he was still in touch, and if Hamilton began to suffer, he'd be right there. As Hamilton's second stop approached, the gap began to come down, albeit marginally. It was going to be so, so close.

Hamilton meanwhile really had a job on, because he had to do the lap times while trying to save fuel, because an extra lap relative to Barrichello could have made all the difference.

He was targeted for lap 37, and the team began to plan for a lap 38 stop - which meant that Kovalainen would have to shuffle forward and take the lap 37 slot. Confirmation finally came from the engineers that Lewis could run the extra lap, but by the time he got the message, he was already heading for the pit entry.

That's what caused the communication error that resulted in his tyres not being quite ready, because it was supposed to be Kovalainen heading in on that lap. And as Hamilton sat waiting, vital seconds ticked away. Heikki of course still had fuel so was told to stay out until lap 38, as originally planned.

The delay was way more than Rubens needed to ensure he got ahead. With Lewis now on the softs and Barrichello the super softs roles were reversed in that final stint, and while it wasn't a cruise, the Brawn man just had to bring it home in one piece.

"I had to push all the way through," said Rubens. "Basically we had different tyres all through the race. There are some questions to see which ones were faster but for sure mine were very consistent and I was able to reduce my lap times every lap. Towards the end of the second stint I was able to catch him a little bit and that gave me some margin for those three or four laps that I pushed after he stopped."

Hamilton was pretty philosophical about it afterwards, giving it the "win as a team lose a team thing," which was pretty decent of him. Had he not won in Hungary he might have been more frustrated, but as he pointed out, not so long ago even points were something of a dream...

"The first part of the race was very well controlled from my point of view," he said. "It was very consistent and nice flowing pace. But in the second stint I was struggling with my tyres and to keep up the pace of Rubens, especially in the high speed corners where he seemed to be catching me, I just did not have the car beneath me to push in those areas to pick up the pace. But nevertheless I kept pushing and the last stint on the primes was a little bit better for me. I just pushed and pushed beyond the limit. It was like a qualifying lap every lap and very close to the wall every time and really I can happily go home knowing that I gave it my all."

Kovalainen ultimately lost out to Kimi Raikkonen, which was a shame as a podium finish would have been a massive boost at a time when his job was under threat. This was another good drive from Kimi, who has been under fire himself a lot recently. He made full use of his KERS button to jump from sixth to fourth at the start, and thereafter didn't put a foot wrong as he lodged a second successive podium place. He could well be an outside contender for victory at Spa next week.

Nico Rosberg continued his extraordinary run of points finishes, and indeed he beat the world championship leader for the fourth consecutive race. His progress might be unspectacular, but he's not making mistakes and is making the most of the car's potential on a given weekend. You can see why he has emerged as a likely contender for a McLaren seat.

Alonso is a man who is known for benchmarking a car, so his sixth place suggests that's pretty much where the Renault should have been this weekend.

The same can't be said for Jenson Button, and the man himself was the first to admit. If your team-mate wins and you are seventh, there's nowhere to hide. He was extremely disappointed with his qualifying error, and even more so with the first lap frustrations that saw him bundled down to ninth.

It all started with Vettel leaning on him, and having backed off to save his front wing, he watched the world and his dog go by. These are difficult times for Jenson, and his role as championship leader means he can't afford to stick his nose in and take risks.

In contrast, Vettel can.

Button was genuinely happy for Barrichello, although a little concerned that his pal is now just 18 points behind. The battle between the two of them is far from clear cut.

"Jenson is always very competitive, he's a hard worker," said Barrichello. "He drives the car very well, very, very smoothly, so you just have to be on the top of your game all the time. I cannot say that yes, from now on it's one way or the other. During the past three years we have been better in some areas of the championship and then he got better and then I got better and the best thing for the team is that we push each other very, very much. I think this is really good for the team."

But the real consolation for JB was the disastrous weekend that Red Bull suffered. A fuel rig problem can happen to anyone, but when you're in the title hunt, the consequences are huge.

Having got ahead of Button with his aggressive start Vettel dropped to 15th after that first stop rig failure. The fact that he had no chance of getting any points didn't make his later engine failure - it was a new unit for qualifying - any easier to bear.

Mark Webber meanwhile just didn't have the pace all weekend, although until the last stop he kept Button at bay, which would have been a useful points' swing. Button pitted a lap earlier, but Webber's last stop was not a great one - he admitted that he might have come to a halt a little out of position - and when he came out, Jenson snuck ahead.

Like Barrichello, Button had a brand new set of supersofts for that final stint, and his mega out lap helped. Even worse for RBR, Robert Kubica also snuck ahead, pushing Webber out of the points.

Immediately after stepping out of the car his frustration was clear. It's hard to believe that just a few weeks ago RBR seemed to be doing everything perfectly. It's amazing how quickly things can change ...

RACE RESULTS

The European Grand Prix
Valencia, Spain;
57 laps; 310.080km;
Weather: Sunny.

Classified:

Pos  Driver        Team                      Time

 1.  Barrichello   Brawn-Mercedes        (B)  1h35:51.289
 2.  Hamilton      McLaren-Mercedes      (B)  +     2.358
 3.  Raikkonen     Ferrari               (B)  +    15.994
 4.  Kovalainen    McLaren-Mercedes      (B)  +    20.032
 5.  Rosberg       Williams-Toyota       (B)  +    20.870
 6.  Alonso        Renault               (B)  +    27.744
 7.  Button        Brawn-Mercedes        (B)  +    34.913
 8.  Kubica        BMW Sauber            (B)  +    36.667
 9.  Webber        Red Bull-Renault      (B)  +    44.910
10.  Sutil         Force India-Mercedes  (B)  +    47.935
11.  Heidfeld      BMW Sauber            (B)  +    48.822
12.  Fisichella    Force India-Mercedes  (B)  +  1:03.614
13.  Trulli        Toyota                (B)  +  1:04.527
14.  Glock         Toyota                (B)  +  1:26.519
15.  Grosjean      Renault               (B)  +  1:31.774
16.  Alguersuari   Toro Rosso-Ferrari    (B)  +     1 lap
17.  Badoer        Ferrari               (B)  +     1 lap
18.  Nakajima      Williams-Toyota       (B)  +    3 laps

Fastest lap: Glock, 1:38.683

Not classified/retirements:

Driver        Team                      On lap
Buemi         Toro Rosso-Ferrari    (B)    42
Vettel        Red Bull-Renault      (B)    24


World Championship standings, round 11:                

Drivers:                    Constructors:             
 1.  Button        72        1.  Brawn-Mercedes        126
 2.  Barrichello   54        2.  Red Bull-Renault       98.5
 3.  Webber        51.5      3.  Ferrari                46
 4.  Vettel        47        4.  McLaren-Mercedes       41
 5.  Rosberg       29.5      5.  Toyota                 38.5
 6.  Hamilton      27        6.  Williams-Toyota        29.5
 7.  Raikkonen     24        7.  Renault                16
 8.  Trulli        22.5      8.  BMW Sauber              9
 9.  Massa         22        9.  Toro Rosso-Ferrari      5
10.  Glock         16       
11.  Alonso        16       
12.  Kovalainen    14       
13.  Heidfeld       6       
14.  Buemi          3       
15.  Kubica         3       
16.  Bourdais       2       
       
All timing unofficial

Lap-by-lap as it happened on AUTOSPORT Live

TEAM BY TEAM

Ferrari

Ferrari's weekend was a tale of two extremes. Badoer struggled on his return after ten years as a test driver and was slowest in all but one session. He finished the race as the final runner, following two spins and a drive-through penalty for crossing the pit exit line - while moving aside to let Grosjean through.

Raikkonen qualified sixth with a promisingly heavy fuel load. The Finn then drove strongly to finish third despite not being happy with his second set of tyres. Ferrari team principal Stefano Domenicali described the result as the 'maximum possible'.

McLaren-Mercedes

Hamilton was given a short-wheelbase chassis to play with and showed promise from practice onwards, despite a damaging spin on Friday that cost him time on and off the track. He took his first pole since China 2008, and Kovalainen made it the team's first front-row lock-out since Hungary last year.

Hamilton led for two thirds of the race but was hunted down by Barrichello. A miscued strategy call caused momentary confusion in his second stop and the Brazilian promptly relegated the world champion to second. Kovalainen dropped behind Barrichello at the first stops and lost another place to Raikkonen at the second to finish fourth.

BMW Sauber

A new lightweight chassis lifted the spirits of Kubica and Heidfeld in free practice. The Pole duly broke into the top ten in qualifying with his team-mate just missing out.

Kubica reported good pace in the race and stayed in touch with Button and Webber's race-long battle for seventh position. He took advantage of that to snatch the last point - his first since Turkey - from Webber at the final stops. Heidfeld was disappointed to get caught in traffic which ultimately stopped him from progressing higher than 11th.

Alonso was his usual feisty self and ended Friday's practice fastest of all, despite colliding with Heidfeld and a late spin. Correctly predicting his pace wouldn't be enough to trouble the front-runners, he qualified eighth. Rookie team-mate Grosjean delivered a workmanlike 14th after a steady performance through practice.

Alonso was one of several to pass Button at the start and ran seventh early-on. He jumped Webber in the first stops and then shadowed Rosberg home for sixth. Grosjean pitted early after damaging his nose in the first-lap scrum. He eventually finished 15th as top rookie after a mid-race spin.

Trulli and Glock struggled to make progress through practice and the Italian in particular was mystified by his lack of pace in qualifying which rendered him 18th, blaming a loss of grip and power.

The race didn't get any better and he trundled home a disgruntled 13th. Glock's race was more eventful, being hit from behind on lap one. Red mist and a hard charge then ensued and it produced a fastest lap of the race - 1m38.683s - two from the end, en route to 14th.

With all the attention on Badoer, Alguersuari was able to get on with the job of learning his craft in F1 this weekend, though the Ferrari sub was the only man he outpaced in qualifying or the race.

Buemi was pleased with a new wing the team brought for the weekend, and then was frustrated that it couldn't take him beyond Q2. Starting 15th, the Swiss was caught in the first corner jam and lost his nose when Glock hit him. Eventually he retired when his right front brake disc exploded.

Tough and ultimately point-less weekend for Red Bull. Vettel suffered an engine failure in practice while Webber found the RB5 ill-suited to Valencia. Vettel qualified fourth and Webber a disappointed ninth.

Vettel was beaten into fifth by a fast-starting Raikkonen, but kept pace until the first stops. His fuel-rig failed to deliver its load though and he was called in a lap later for more. Not long after that Vettel suffered another terminal engine failure while running 16th. Webber came home an off-par ninth having lost out to Button and Kubica at the final stops

Rosberg and Nakajima showed their usual promise in free practice. The German qualified seventh and heaviest of those in Q3, while Nakajima suffered a failure that placed him 17th.

Rosberg predictably, was one of the last of the front-runners to pit in the race, from sixth. That became fifth after Vettel's retirement. That's where he finished after a fruitless chase of Kovalainen. Nakajima had a puncture and then stopped with a problem a few laps from the end, classified 18th.

Strong free practice for the team's significantly upgraded car saw Sutil set the fastest time of all on Saturday morning. The German couldn't quite translate that into Q3 pace and qualified 12th, four grid slots ahead of Fisichella.

Sutil finished 10th in the race having passed Heidfeld in the pits. Fisichella opted for a one-stop strategy, which brought him into play in the battle between Button and Webber for seventh/eighth, that is until he pitted. After that it was a sensible run to 12th.

Button and Barrichello were delighted and relieved to discover their BGP001s 'switch on' their tyres in free practice. The Brazilian had better pace in qualifying and was fastest non-McLaren. Button made a small error that dropped him to fifth.

Barrichello hounded the McLarens and passed one in each pitstop. His superior pace and controlled aggressive driving netted him a tenth career win in what Ross Brawn described as one of his 'best drives'.

Button was blocked by both Red Bulls off the start and dropped to eighth. That became ninth when he had to let Webber past for cutting a chicane. Ran slowly in traffic, then quickly in free air later in the race to re-pass the Australian in the pits and take seventh.