Ferrari eager to return to the track after summer break

After a long summer break, the Formula 1 action resumes this weekend at one of the sport’s most charismatic venues, the 7.004 kilometres of Spa-Francorchamps, the Belgian circuit that has hosted 43 of the 55 Belgian Grands Prix held to date.

Sauber to pair known driver with rookie

Sauber's 2010 driver lineup may feature a veteran alongside an inexperienced youngster...  

Hamilton and Button lead in practice

• Lewis Hamilton leads from Jenson Button by only 0.096sec• Sebastian Vettel third fastest on new grand prix circuitLewis Hamilton and Jenson Button formed a British one-two in first practice for the inaugural Abu Dhabi grand prix today. Last year's world champion and the driver who deposed him 12 days ago in Brazil were separated by only 0.096 seconds after the opening 90 minutes of track action at the £800m Yas Marina circuit.If current rumours eventually prove to be true, Hamilton and Button may even be team-mates at McLaren next season should the latter fail to agree a new deal with Brawn GP. For now they remain on opposing sides and both looked impressive as they set about tackling a venue that the F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone feels will never be beaten.Naturally, there was a settling-in period for all the drivers, with Jaime Alguersuari in his Toro Rosso the first to post a timed lap of 1min 57sec. But by the conclusion of the session, Hamilton had just managed to dip under 1min 44sec, with the best of his 18 laps timed at 1:43.939, with Button in close attendance at 1:44.035.Button, admitting to feeling far more relaxed with the title under his belt, was the first to suffer a spin, although it was nothing major. The 29-year-old pushed too hard into one corner as he emerged out of the shadow of the hotel that straddles the 21-turn track.Sebastian Vettel, looking for a small degree of consolation for this season by finishing second behind Button in the standings, was third quickest, 0.214sec behind Hamilton.Button's team-mate Rubens Barrichello still has a say, though, after failing to take the title race down to the wire in Brazil 12 days ago when he finished only eighth from pole position. Barrichello finished just 0.054sec behind Vettel on the 5.554km track, and 0.268sec adrift of Hamilton, with the top four easily clear of any of their rivals.BMW Sauber's Nick Heidfeld was fifth overall, but 0.728sec down, followed closely by Sébastien Buemi in his Toro Rosso and Adrian Sutil for Force India.The Brazilian grand prix winner Mark Webber was eighth, and the only other driver to finish within a second of Hamilton, with the top 10 completed by Alguersuari and Toyota's Jarno Trulli.The Ferraris of Kimi Raikkonen and Giancarlo Fisichella were down in 15th and 18th places, with Renault's Romain Grosjean bringing up the rear, albeit nearly 2.5sec off the pace.Formula OneLewis HamiltonJenson ButtonMotor sportguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Battle of the engines

With the 2009 championship now completed, Mercedes can bask in the knowledge that its engines were the dominating force in Formula One this year, with rival Renault taking second place ahead of Toyota, Ferrari and BMW...  

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

Red Bull have day in sun as Button signs off in style

Despite all the opulence, and the stunning Yas Hotel roof whose colours flickered dramatically as day turned to dusk in the inaugural day/night race here, only Jenson Button's late charge in pursuit of Mark Webber saved the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix from being the Abu Dullbi race.