Williams keen to finalise driver line-up

Williams will decide "in the coming weeks" whether to sign Nico Hulkenberg as a race driver for next season...  

Williams on lookout for new engine supplier?

Williams may be on the lookout for a new engine supplier for next season...  

Vettel closes gap on Button in Japan

• Vettel wins from pole with Lewis Hamilton third• Button finishes eighth but stays 14 points clearJenson Button's slow march towards the world title took another step closer to completion in Japan, despite Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel winning from pole. Button, finishing down in eighth, saw his lead cut by a point, but remains 14 clear with just two races to go.Vettel kept alive his outside chance of winning the drivers' championship, moving to within 16 points of Button. The German crossed the line ahead of Jarno Trulli's Toyota with Lewis Hamilton in third for McLaren.Vettel's third win of the season helped to close the gap at the top, but Button's Brawn team-mate, Rubens Barrichello, remains the Briton's closest challenger having crossed the line a place ahead in seventh.Brawn could have wrapped up the constructors' title, but were denied after the safety car was brought on to the track with five laps to go. Button, however, was unhappy with Williams' Nico Rosberg, for allegedly setting his fastest sector time while drivers were under restrictions – an issue the race stewards were looking in to.As things stand, Brawn will need just half a point more to claim the crown when the teams move on to Brazil in two weeks' time, while Button could secure his first world title merely by keeping pace with Barrichello and Vettel.Race standings1 Sebastian Vettel (Ger) Red Bull 01:28:20.443; 2 Jarno Trulli (Ita) Toyota 01:28:25.243; 3 Lewis Hamilton (Gbr) McLaren 01:28:26.843; 4 Kimi Raikkonen (Fin) Ferrari 01:28:28.343; 5 Nico Rosberg (Ger) Williams 01:28:29.143; 6 Nick Heidfeld (Ger) BMW Sauber 01:28:29.943; 7 Rubens Barrichello (Bra) Brawn GP 01:28:31.043; 8 Jenson Button (Gbr) Brawn GP 01:28:31.843; 9 Robert Kubica (Pol) BMW Sauber 01:28:32.143; 10 Fernando Alonso (Spa) Renault 01:28:33.443; 11 Heikki Kovalainen (Fin) McLaren 01:28:34.143; 12 Giancarlo Fisichella (Ita) Ferrari 01:28:34.943; 13 Adrian Sutil (Ger) Force India 01:28:35.343; 14 Vitantonio Liuzzi (Ita) Force India 01:28:36.143; 15 Kazuki Nakajima (Jpn) Williams 01:28:38.343Not Classified: 16 Romain Grosjean (Fra) Renault +1 lap; 17 Mark Webber (Aus) Red Bull +2 laps; 18 Jaime Alguersuari (Spa) Scuderia Toro Rosso +10 laps; 19 Sebastien Buemi (Swi) Scuderia Toro Rosso +42 lapsDNS: 20 Timo Glock (Ger) ToyotaWorld championship standings1 Jenson Button (Gbr) Brawn GP 85.0pts; 2 Rubens Barrichello (Bra) Brawn GP 71.0; 3 Sebastian Vettel (Ger) Red Bull 69.0; 4 Mark Webber (Aus) Red Bull 51.5; 5 Kimi Raikkonen (Fin) Ferrari 45.0; 6 Lewis Hamilton (Gbr) McLaren 43.0; 7 Nico Rosberg (Ger) Williams 34.5; 8 Jarno Trulli (Ita) Toyota 30.5; 9 Fernando Alonso (Spa) Renault 26.0; 10 Timo Glock (Ger) Toyota 24.0; 11 Felipe Massa (Bra) Ferrari 22.0; 12 Heikki Kovalainen (Fin) McLaren 22.0; 13 Nick Heidfeld (Ger) BMW Sauber 15.0; 14 Robert Kubica (Pol) BMW Sauber 9.0; 15 Giancarlo Fisichella (Ita) Ferrari 8.0; 16 Adrian Sutil (Ger) Force India 5.0; 17 Sebastien Buemi (Swi) Scuderia Toro Rosso 3.0; 18 Sebastien Bourdais (Fra) Scuderia Toro Rosso 2.0; six drivers on zero pointsFormula OneSebastian VettelJenson ButtonRed BullBrawnMotor sportguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Button wins F1 world championship

• Australian wins as Button takes title with calm drive to fifth• Pit-lane fire adds to the drama in an incident-packed raceA first lap containing spins, shunts and a pit-lane fireball – more incidents, in fact, than most entire races – set the scene for today's Brazilian grand prix, an absorbing contest in which the celebrations were shared by Mark Webber, winning for the second time this season in his Red Bull-Renault, and Jenson Button, whose fifth place brought him and the Brawn-Mercedes team the double of the 2009 world drivers' and constructors' championships.Given the testing circumstances, Button's drive was the equal of the very best of the six victories he collected in the first half of the see-sawing season. After a catastrophic qualifying session he took his fate into his own hands and drove with controlled aggression. When the slightest mistake would have meant disaster, he executed a series of overtaking manoeuvres with measured authority.At the start of the afternoon the permutations were almost endless. A podium finish would secure the title for Button but a poor tyre choice on Saturday reduced him to 14th place on the grid and gave hope to his team-mate Rubens Barrichello, starting from pole position in front of his home crowd. Sebastian Vettel, the championship outsider, needed both a victory and a bad day for both Brawn drivers, but was another Saturday casualty and started one place behind Button.Within a lap much had changed. Adrian Sutil's Force India, starting from third on the grid, was overtaken by Kimi Raikkonen's Ferrari as the cars plunged through the dramatic downhill esses and then tangled with Jarno Trulli's Toyota at high speed, putting both cars out. The Italian veteran, believing he had been edged off the track, confronted the young German with a series of gestures suggesting that they might be meeting again to sort it out away from the public gaze. The stewards ruled that it had been a racing incident but fined Trulli $10,000 for refusing to leave the track and for the manner of his confrontion with Sutil.Meanwhile Heikki Kovalainen had spun his McLaren halfway round the lap, forcing another tailender, Giancarlo Fisichella's Ferrari, on to the grass. Kovalainen dived into the pits for new tyres and left just ahead of Raikkonen, who had lost his front wing while trying to pass Webber. The McLaren driver, however, restarted with the fuel hose still attached (for which the team were fined $50,000), covering his fellow Finn's Ferrari in a film of petrol which ignited in a spectacular blaze that momentarily blinded Raikkonen but was quickly extinguished by the airflow as he accelerated away. "An interesting first lap, as usual here," Webber said, with dry understatement. At the end of it, with the safety car out, the Australian was tucked in behind Barrichello and ahead of Nico Rosberg's Williams and Robert Kubica's BMW-Sauber.Profiting from the misfortunes of others and from his own success in staying out of other people's accidents, Button was already up to ninth position and preparing to go about the business of improving his prospects. Cool and decisive moves in the esses took him past Romain Grosjean's Renault and Kazuki Nakajima's Williams on successive laps but Kamui Kobayashi, a grand prix debutant replacing Timo Glock at the wheel of the second Toyota, proved a more troublesome obstacle.For 18 laps Button sat behind the Japanese driver, observing his opponent's questionable racing etiquette before picking his moment to pass. "That guy is crazy," he said later. "He moves a lot in the braking zones, which makes it very difficult, as Nakajima found out." The other Japanese driver's attempt to overtake his compatriot ended in an expensive shower of carbon fibre, his Williams smashing itself against the barriers while the Toyota continued on its erratic way, eventually finishing 10th.Now up to sixth place, Button was able to follow his strategy in relative peace, his position improved – and his title sealed – when Barrichello, having slipped to third behind Webber and Kubica during the first stops, suffered a puncture with eight laps to go. A third pit stop relegated the Brazilian to eighth place, continuing his run of appalling luck at his home circuit. Like Vettel, who finished an excellent fourth after a fighting drive, he saw his championship chances disappear.The final place on the podium went to the McLaren of Lewis Hamilton, his drive from 17th place on the grid doing great credit to a man relinquishing his title but already making plans to mount a challenge to its new holder next year.Formula OneJenson ButtonBrawnRed BullMotor sportRichard Williamsguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Hamilton storms to pole for Italy GP

• Adrian Sutil second and Kimi Raikkonen third• Jenson Button to start in sixth placeLewis Hamilton stormed to the 15th pole position of his career ahead of tomorrow's Italian grand prix. The reigning world champion saved it until the final moment as he was the last to cross the line in a hotly contested final ten-minute showdown, deposing Force India's Adrian Sutil from top spot.There was a possibility Hamilton could be penalised, though, as he appeared to impede Toro Rosso's Sebastien Buemi late on in the initial 20-minute Q1. However, given Buemi was never going to make it into the next session, it was hard to imagine the stewards penalising Hamilton.After claiming his second pole position of the year, and pipping close friend Sutil, Hamilton said: "It was a very close qualifying session, and I'm very happy to see Adrian up here. Since Formula Three it's been a long time since we've been in a press conference together, and on the front row. But it was such a great feeling to put a great lap together."People need to understand, you have one shot at it at the end, so to pull it off is amazing. I don't think we anticipated being just as quick as we are this weekend, so it's a bonus to everyone in the team."Behind another unusual front row, given Sutil's performance, Kimi Raikkonen again gave Ferrari something to cheer. He will start third, with the 2007 world champion joined on the second row by his fellow Finn, McLaren's Heikki Kovalainen.The Brawns, clearly back in form after their recent struggles, are on the third row, with Rubens Barrichello starting fifth and Jenson Button sixth, the Brazilian out-qualifying the Briton for the third successive race.On his debut for Force India, Tonio Liuzzi gave the team another historic moment as he will start seventh, the first time they have managed to get both cars into the top 10. Renault's Fernando Alonso starts eighth, followed by the Red Bulls of Sebastian Vettel and Mark Webber, their title hopes fading further.BMW Sauber suffered a wretched Q2 as both Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld retired, with engine trouble. Kubica will start 13th and Heidfeld 15th, with the man to split them being Giancarlo Fisichella on his debut for Ferrari. The 36-year-old has clearly struggled to adapt to the car in the wake of his move from Force India nine days ago, notably crashing it this morning in final practice.Toyota's Jarno Trulli will start from 11th, with Romain Grosjean a semi-respectable 12th for Renault bearing in mind his car has KERS on board this weekend.Williams' fears regarding this circuit were certainly realised as both Kazuki Nakajima and Nico Rosberg failed to make it out of Q1. For Rosberg, who had qualified in the top 10 in 11 of the previous 12 races this season, the 24-year-old will start from his lowest position of the year in 18th, one place behind Nakajima.Toyota's Timo Glock was another unable to find the downforce and power required for Monza as he starts 16th, with the Toro Rossos bringing up the rear. Buemi will line up 19th, with Jaime Alguersuari 20th, the young Spaniard's five-place grid penalty for a gearbox change after final practice not counting for anything on this occasion.Positions after qualifying1 Lewis Hamilton (Gbr) McLaren 1min 24.066secs, 2 Adrian Sutil (Ger) Force India 1:24.261, 3 Kimi Raikkonen (Fin) Ferrari 1:24.523, 4 Heikki Kovalainen (Fin) McLaren 1:24.845, 5 Rubens Barrichello (Bra) Brawn GP 1:25.015, 6 Jenson Button (Gbr) Brawn GP 1:25.030, 7 Vitantonio Liuzzi (Ita) Force India 1:25.043, 8 Fernando Alonso (Spa) Renault 1:25.072, 9 Sebastian Vettel (Ger) Red Bull 1:25.180, 10 Mark Webber (Aus) Red Bull 1:25.314, 11 Jarno Trulli (Ita) Toyota 1:23.611, 12 Romain Grosjean (Fra) Renault 1:23.728, 13 Robert Kubica (Pol) BMW Sauber 1:23.866, 14 Giancarlo Fisichella (Ita) Ferrari 1:23.901, 15 Nick Heidfeld (Ger) BMW Sauber 1:24.275, 16 Timo Glock (Ger) Toyota 1:24.036, 17 Kazuki Nakajima (Jpn) Williams 1:24.074, 18 Nico Rosberg (Ger) Williams 1:24.121, 19 Sebastien Buemi (Swi) Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:24.220, 20 Jaime Alguersuari (Spa) Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:24.951Formula OneMotor sportLewis Hamiltonguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Trulli on top for Toyota at sunny Suzuka

After the near washout of Friday, the final practice session ahead of the all-important qualifying session for the Japanese Grand Prix saw Jarno Trulli set the pace for Toyota in sunny conditions with a best lap of 1:31...