Brazilian Rubens Barrichello seized pole position on Saturday for his home grand prix in a nightmare scenario for championship-leading Brawn teammate Jenson Button.
Britain’s Button, 14 points clear of the Sao Paulo driver with just two races remaining, qualified only 14th in a marathon rain-delayed qualifying session that ranked as one of Formula One’s longest.
The third man in the title battle, Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel, is 16 points behind Button and will start in 16th place after being caught out by the weather.
PHOTO: AFP
Barrichello timed his first pole of the season, and first since the 2004 Brazilian Grand Prix, to perfection and is now well-placed to take the title battle down to the wire in Abu Dhabi.
The passionate local crowd, who had waited patiently through a rain delay of more than an hour and a half at the bowl-like Interlagos circuit, stood and roared in delight with cheers of “Rubinho, Rubinho.”
Australian Mark Webber will share the front row with Barrichello in his Red Bull, who had to finish one-two yesterday to have any hope of preventing Brawn from winning the constructors’ title.
“I’m keeping my feet on the ground because we have won nothing yet,” said Barrichello, who has never won his home race despite twice previously starting on pole.”
“I’m not watching what’s going on on the side, just focusing. I will race as fast as I can to win the race and when its finished I’ll get on the radio to see what happened to Jenson and Sebastian,” the 37-year-old said.
Despite his speed, Barrichello only just made it through to the final phase of qualifying in 10th place while Button failed altogether and will line up in a risky position alongside Renault’s error-prone rookie Romain Grosjean.
“[At] the start of the session, we had way too much understeer and I couldn’t do anything with it and then on lap three, the rear started going away,” Button told reporters. “We made a mistake not putting inters [intermediate tires] on at the end. It’s all of our decision, it’s a team effort.”
Vettel must finish second to stay in the hunt but he refused to give up his title hopes, vowing to race yesterday “with the knife between our teeth.”
“I think I went to the pool not the racetrack today. Obviously it’s extremely disappointing. That’s life,” the 22-year-old German said.
Force India’s Adrian Sutil qualified third, with Italian Jarno Trulli fourth for Toyota. They will have Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen and Toro Rosso’s Swiss rookie Sebastien Buemi behind them on the third row.
Outgoing Formula One champion Lewis Hamilton and his McLaren teammate Heikki Kovalainen also failed to make it through the opening session, with the Briton qualifying 18th.
“The conditions were awful but, wow, our car was terrible,” Hamilton said.
The first phase of qualifying was halted after four minutes when Italian Giancarlo Fisichella spun and stalled his Ferrari, with the car having to be lifted off the track with a crane. There was a 14-minute delay before qualifying resumed.
The start of the second phase was also delayed by heavy rain and, once it had started, stopped after two and a half minutes when Force India’s Vitantonio Liuzzi crashed heavily at the end of the pit straight.
The impact, with the car hitting the tire wall backwards, ripped both the rear wheels off but the Italian clambered out unhurt and waved to the crowd.
Four-time NBA all-star DeMarcus Cousins arrived in Taiwan with his family early yesterday to finish his renewed contract with the Taiwan Beer Leopards in the T1 League. Cousins initially played a four-game contract with the Leopards in January. On March 18, the Taoyuan-based team announced that Cousins had renewed his contract. “Hi what’s up Leopard fans, I’m back. I’m excited to be back and can’t wait to join the team,” Cousins said in a video posted on the Leopard’s Facebook page. “Most of all, can’t wait to see you guys, the fans, next weekend. So make sure you come out and support the Beer
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
Rafael Nadal on Wednesday said the upcoming French Open would be the moment to “give everything and die” on the court after his comeback from injury in Barcelona was curtailed by Alex de Minaur. The 22-time Grand Slam title winner, back playing this week after three months on the sidelines, battled well, but eventually crumbled 7-5, 6-1 against the world No. 11 from Australia in the second round. Nadal, 37, who missed virtually all of last season, is hoping to compete at the French Open next month where he is the record 14-time champion. The Spaniard said the clash with De Minaur was