Jenson Button lapped world champion Lewis Hamilton in the closing stages en route to his fourth win in five season races at the Spanish Formula One Grand Prix yesterday for Brawn GP.
Button won ahead of Rubens Barrichello in another one-two finish for the former Honda team.
Button made the most of a two-stop pit strategy, while Barrichello didn’t push hard enough to prevail in his car with three stops, even though he won the start from third place on the grid.
Mark Webber came from behind to take third place for Red Bull and German teammate Sebastian Vettel placed fourth as Felipe Massa ran out of fuel in the end in a Ferrari and finished sixth after also having to let Fernando Alonso in a Renault pass.
Button claimed his fourth season win and fifth overall. It was the second one-two for Brawn this year, with Button winning from Barrichello in Australia as well.
The current pecking order was not fully shaken up in the first European race as Button leads the way with 41 points from five races ahead of Barrichello (27) and German Vettel (23).
Barrichello won the start from third place on the grid as he passed Vettel and Button, and Massa also moved past Vettel into third place while the German plunged from second to fourth.
A few meters back Nico Rosberg appeared to shift the Toyota of Jarno Trulli off the piste in the second turn, which set off a chain reaction. Trulli drove into the Force India of Adrian Sutil and the Toro Rosso’s of Sebastien Buemi and Sebastien Bourdaix also crashed out.
The safety car came out for five laps as the four wrecks needed to be lifted off the piste and the debris cleared.
There was no change on the restart as Barrichello remained in command and Vettel had no chance to move past Massa despite driving a faster car as the Brazilian successfully used the power booster KERS.
Barrichello drove hard from the front to get the necessary advantage, pitted again in the 31st and in the 50th for the final time, but he failed again to get his first win since the 2004 China GP.
The Briton took the lead once Barrichello refueled the last time and clinched the win in 1 hour, 37 minutes and 19.202 seconds.
Webber made the most of a long second stint on soft tires to move ahead of Massa and Vettel into third place, while Massa lost fourth place in the end because of the fuel problem.
Further back, long-time rivals Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton dueled briefly but only the Spanish Renault driver Alonso eventually made the points in his home race in fifth place.
Massa limped home in sixth, Nick Heidfeld was seventh in a BMW and Rosberg got the final point for Williams in eighth place.
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