Jenson Button drove to a well deserved third place, behind Aussie Mark Webber and Seb Vettel, in the final race of the 2009 Formula One season the Abu Dhabi Gran Prix earlier today.

Jenson jumped team mate Rubens Barichello in the opening laps to move into 4th eventually claiming third, and almost 2nd place, in the closing laps, with a stellar last lap dice with Mark Webber’s Red Bull. Following Hamiltons retirement with suspected brake problems Seb Vettel, also in the Red Bull, drove a calculated racing to take his 4th win of the season and wind up in 2nd place in the World Championship Driver standings.

Agai Abu Dhabi turned on a spectacular light show as the sun set over the Persian Gulf during the race and the track lighting and Yas marina Hotel light show gave the whole area a Las Vegas feel.

The official Brawn GP website posted the following statement after the race:

“Brawn GP’s Jenson Button finished his World Championship year on a high today with a third-placed podium finish at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix at the new Yas Marina Circuit. Team-mate Rubens Barrichello came through a first corner impact to drive a composed race and bring his Brawn-Mercedes car home in fourth position.

Formula One’s first twilight race began at 1700 in daylight conditions before night fell and the floodlights came on around the circuit. Both Brawn GP drivers had good starts before Rubens made slight contact with Mark Webber going into turn one and damaged his front wing which allowed Jenson to pass whilst he struggled for downforce.

From there, Jenson and Rubens drove extremely well to secure third and fourth positions respectively on two-stop strategies. Jenson had a thrilling battle with Mark Webber over the final few laps for second place with several overtaking moves almost coming off on the final lap but the Australian managed to hold him off to the chequered flag.

After 17 races of the 2009 season, Brawn GP end the year as winners of the Constructors’ Championship with 172 points with Jenson winning his first Drivers’ Championship with 95 points and Rubens in third place with 77 points.”

It was a fitting end to a great season and with some seats up for grabs and no Official testing until February the teams head for a well-deserved break.

Singlemalt TV will be reporting on events during the off season and will follow the full Championship in 2010.

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 1st, 2009 at 4:53 pm and is filed under Favorite Drams. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.