Again no points for Button
After battling hard for the final world championship point, Jenson Button finished the Canadian Grand Prix in ninth place this afternoon, ending a disappointing afternoon for the Honda Racing F1 Team.
The race had promised a lot more for the team, with Jenson and team-mate Rubens Barrichello starting from eighth and ninth places on the grid. At the start, Jenson made a good get-away to be eighth at the end of lap one, while Rubens lost three places at the start and was 12th.
Jenson gained two places on lap two when Nico Rosberg and Juan Pablo Montoya crashed ahead of him, bringing out the Safety Car. The race re-started a lap later and Jenson immediately pulled out a gap to the pursuing Jacques Villeneuve.
Rubens continued to circulate in 12th place, but he felt his engine tighten on lap 12 and he was forced to retire.
During the first round of pitstops, Jenson moved up to fifth place before stopping on lap 27. He was stationary for 8.6s and rejoined the race in ninth position.
During the middle stint of the race, he continued in ninth place. He made his second pitstop on lap 53, and inherited eighth place when Villeneuve, who was one place ahead, crashed into the retaining wall.
The Safety Car came out while the debris from Villeneuve’s car was removed and, when the race re-started with nine laps remaining, Jenson was put under intense pressure by David Coulthard. They had a tough battle but, unable to maintain a competitive pace due to his handling problems, he eventually succumbed to Coulthard.
At the front, Fernando Alonso scored his sixth win of the year and, in so doing, took Michelin’s 100th grand prix victory.
Jenson Button "It’s been a very frustrating day for me. I had no grip with either the front or rear tyres, as well as understeer and a lack of traction. The difficulty with this circuit is that there is just so much rubber going down which leaves marbles on every corner. If you make a slight mistake or lock-up, you go off-line and then you lose a few seconds trying to get the tyres back up to temperature. The car was difficult to drive all day and it's disappointing to finish outside of the points, which was our aim. We have to get through Indianapolis now and do the best we can with the car we have, then we’ll be testing a new package ready for France next month.
Rubens Barrichello "A disappointing way to end my race. The engine felt quite tight from the beginning of the race then after my 11th lap, you could see I was losing a lot of places as everyone was able to overtake me on the straights as I just started to lose power. The team are making a real effort to find more reliability and horsepower with the engine so we'll just have to analyse this problem, see what the cause was and hopefully resolve it before the next race in Indianapolis."
Gil de Ferran, Sporting Director "It is fair to say that this was a very disappointing day for us. Rubens’ engine tightened which led to his retirement and we are still investigating the cause of the problem. Jenson did well at the beginning but struggled with his car throughout the race, eventually dropping back to 9th."
