Title rivals press all the wrong buttons

FORMULA ONE SINGAPORE GRAND PRIX:IF THERE is a little bit of luck needed in a championship win, a conspiracy of events which propel a driver, unaided, towards glory, then Jenson Button used up his full quota yesterday to finish fifth at a Singapore Grand Prix utterly dominated by Lewis Hamilton.

Defending world champion Hamilton had sailed to pole position on Saturday after an accident involving Rubens Barrichello halted his main rivals’ final runs. And, save for an early problem with his KERS system which was solved from the pit wall and a mid-race burst of pressure from Red Bull Racing’s Sebastian Vettel, Hamilton cruised through the race’s 61 laps to take an 11th career win.

The McLaren driver insisted the punishing conditions in hot and humid Singapore had made victory harder than it seemed. “It was a tough race, not easy that’s for sure. There is no break, so the focus is as much as you could possibly get. I came here hoping to have a good result and hoping to redeem myself after crashing in Monza, I did it, and I’m very, very happy. But it was a very, very tough race.”

Not as difficult as for others, though. Indeed, it was the troubles plaguing rivals that gave Button a result he may yet look back on as the most significant of the second half of his season.

Following a solid effort on Friday, with Button hovering near to the top of the timesheets, the championship leader’s weekend began to unravel on Saturday.

For the final practice session he opted to switch to team-mate Barrichello’s settings and the result was disaster, Button fishtailing his way round the final laps of the session and, over his car radio, desperately calling on his engineer to fix the problem.

But with qualifying just a couple of hours away, rewinding to the previous day’s baseline would always be a stop-gap solution and in the grid shoot-out Button was eliminated in the second segment, slotting into 12th on the grid.

With title rivals Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber in second and fourth respectively and with Barrichello fifth-fastest, things were looking grim.

But even before the race start Button was lucking in. Prior to qualifying, team-mate Barrichello had changed his gearbox, incurring a five-place grid penalty.

And later Nick Heidfeld, who had qualified eighth, was found to have an underweight car and was dropped back to a pitlane start, bumping Button to 11th, directly behind his team-mate.

But it was in the race that the real good fortune fell.

At the start Button picked up one place, but had to watch on as Barrichello scrambled to seventh. Up ahead, though, things were already going wrong for Red Bull, Vettel passed by the fast-starting Nico Rosberg and Webber dropped to sixth after he was adjudged to have illegally re-passed Fernando Alonso and Timo Glock after losing out to the pair in turn one. That was as much as Button could have hoped for and the rest of the first stint played out normally. But then the race really began to play into his hands.

First, following his first pit stop, second-placed Nico Rosberg crossed the white line of the pit exit, earning himself a drive-through penalty which dropped him to the back of the field and out of the equation. Then, after looking like a potential victor as he pressured Hamilton in the middle stint, Vettel too was hamstrung, the German too incurring a drive through penalty for speeding in the pit lane during his second stop. That dumped Vettel back to fourth for just a solitary point gained on Button.

And Webber, fourth in the title standings before the race, was soon gone, the Australian’s front right brake disc letting go on lap 46. That crash gave McLaren the jitters and, expecting a safety car that never came, they pitted Heikko Kovalainen early, clearing the Finn from in front of Button and, with a clear track and fuel to play with, Button clawed away enough time to not only leapfrog the McLaren, but also title rival Barrichello. From a disastrous original 12th on the grid, Button had risen, almost by default, seven places to score four crucial points to extend his championship lead over his team-mate to 15 with three rounds remaining.

With none of the title contenders able to reach the podium positions it was left to Timo Glock of Toyota to claim second and Fernando Alonso to prove a point for Renault by finishing third.

Afterwards the Spaniard dedicated the result to disgraced former team boss Flavio Braitore saying: “This podium is a particular moment after what happened . . . and I dedicate this podium to Flavio – he is at home, but he is part of the success we had today.”