2011 Japanese Grand Prix - Button wins the battle; Vettel retains his title

CHAMP: Third place for Vettel was enough for a second title

SEBASTIAN Vettel made history this morning in Japan by securing the one point he required to become the youngest ever back-to-back Formula One world champion.  The German, 24 finished in third place at Suzuka to finally extinguish the final hope from a potential championship challenge in the form of Jenson Button.  However, Button won this tremendous Japanese Grand Prix in style to not only cement his position in second place in the driver’s championship, but lay down a serious marker that things might be significantly different in 2012.

GRASSY: Vettel squeezes out Button on the rundown to turn one

    Vettel arrived in Japan looking very relaxed, with just one point required to finish the job and finally rubberstamp the seal on a dominant season, which has seen his Red Bull dismantle a top-quality field.  Even if he remarkably failed to get anymore points between this race and the season’s conclusion in Brazil on November 27, Button would have to win every single event left on the 2011 calendar.  This weekend, the McLaren looked the better package around this high-speed venue and only an immense lap from Vettel earnt him his customary pole position yesterday.  He didn’t waste his advantage at the start of the race either, which irked Button.  Sebastian moved across the road to defend his position into the first corner, leaving Jenson with the choice of having a silly accident or backing off onto the grass.  Sensibly, Jenson lifted and this forced hesitation allowed Lewis Hamilton into second place.  Button was livid and wanted his title rival to get a penalty for his questionable driving.  Rightfully, the race stewards looked into the incident, but correctly decided not to take further action.

      With high tyre degradation levels from the Pirelli tyres this weekend, managing the rubber was going to always be the decisive factor, with DRS not playing so much of a crucial role in Japan.  Hamilton picked up a slow puncture early on and had to let Button through into second, before being forced to pit.  His podium chances were finished and once again, Lewis would have a run-in with his best mate at the moment, Felipe Massa.  The pair made contact on lap 24 into the final chicane, with a piece of debris coming off the Ferrari in the process.  Again, the stewards took a closer look, but decided that Hamilton’s strong defensive driving was legal.  However, the Safety Car was curiously called out to remove the tiny, offending Ferrari piece of bodywork on the road. 

     Button seemed to have the measure of Vettel on the option tyre and with the champion-elect’s setup indicating higher tyre wear, the McLaren was able to take the lead at the second round of stops and control proceedings from there.  His pace on the Safety Car restart was blistering, whilst Vettel’s tyres kept …blistering.  After another stop, the German got bottled up behind Adrian Sutil for two laps and this enabled the canny Fernando Alonso to leapfrog Vettel into second place.  Slightly ahead of them and Michael Schumacher took the opportunity to lead some laps thanks to the bunching up behind the pace car.  It means Schumacher becomes the oldest driver to lead any racing laps since Sir Jack Brabham in 1961 and that’s a record Vettel will struggle to take.  In the closing stages, Alonso upped the ante and forced Button, who was in fuel saving mode, to respond.  As you would expect from the 2009 world champion, he did and crossed the line approximately two seconds infront of the Spaniard to record his third win of the season.  Vettel kept pushing, but knowing that the podium was safe, held back to take the 15 points on offer for third position and sealed the inevitable of becoming 2011 FIA Formula One World Champion.

     Behind them, Mark Webber drove to fourth in the second Red Bull, to strengthen the team’s constructor’s championship ambitions.  Hamilton described his race as ‘shocking’ afterwards, but still recorded fifth, ahead of Schumacher and Massa, who put in another poor performance in the sister Ferrari, considering he outqualified Alonso on Saturday.  Sergio Perez came eighth for Sauber, holding off the effects of a flu bug that made him look as white as a sheep all weekend.  Vitaly Petrov’s fighting ninth place keeps Lotus Renault well on course for fifth in the constructor’s championship and Nico Rosberg made use of his five sets of fresh tyres after a hydraulics failure eliminated him in Q1.  Rosberg’s point was a good performance, ahead of both Force India’s and the local hero, Kamur Kobayashi.  Although it earnt nothing, Adrian Sutil pulled off the move of the race and potentially the season, when he drilled Kobayashi on the inside of the daunting 130R, on worn tyres and the dirty racing line.  It was a brave and superb piece of driving from Sutil and it earnt him, 11^th place and no points.  The only retirement of the afternoon was Sebastian Buemi, who had to pull off when a tyre wasn’t fitted onto his Toro Rosso properly after his first pitstop.

SOAKING: Winner Button gets a nice champagne shower from Vettel

     The emotion on Button’s face was clear afterwards, as he lives in Japan for most of the year with his beautiful Japanese girlfriend, Jessica.  Having spent several years driving for Honda too, you can understand Jenson’s affection for the place.  This was his first dry race win for McLaren and on this evidence, he will win more before the end of the season.  It was a great performance and in his celebrations, he pointed to his special helmet, which is to be auctioned off for charity to help those still suffering from the after-effects of the devastating tsunami to hit the country in March.

     However, Sebastian Vettel steals the limelight today with his incredible feat, in what has been an almost faultless season.  This won’t be his last title either and many of Schumacher’s records look increasingly under threat now, from this latest German wunderkind.  He joins Alberto Ascari, Juan Manuel Fangio, Brabham, Alain Prost, Ayrton Senna, Schumacher, Mika Hakkinen and Alonso in the shortlist of back-to-back world champions and it is a list he fully deserves to be on.  Although the constructor’s championship still needs to be sorted, we can now go racing and enjoy the final four races of the season, starting with next weekend’s Korean Grand Prix.

Congratulations to Sebastian Vettel and Red Bull Racing on their title success; the kings of Formula One in 2011.