Left field

The F1 title race, in old money

McLaren’s Formula One champions Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton have both sought solace in the scoring system after recent setbacks.

But in fact, if they did the maths they might feel a little bit sore. Applying the 2009 points to the 2010 results so far, the title battle would actually be even tighter.

“I think the new points system has definitely amplified what people think of the standings, but I’ve always imagined the points as they would have been under last year’s system,” Button said after last weekend’s Singapore Grand Prix left him fifth overall and 25 points adrift of Red Bull’s championship leader Mark Webber.

“So, in old money, I’m 10 points off Mark, and Lewis is about eight or nine behind him. And, with four races to go, that’s not much at all.”

“When you say you’re 25 points off the lead, that sounds a lot – but it’s just easier for me to reference it by the old system. It makes it seem easier to understand and compute, too.”

Hamilton, who has retired from three of the last four races, is 20 points behind Webber with four races remaining while Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso is 11 off the Australian.

“That’s still less than a race win,” said Hamilton. “It’s easy to get disheartened by being 20 points away, because it sounds such a lot, but under last year’s rules, that’s only about eight points – and to be eight points off with four races left is nothing really.”

Who do you think you are? Jenson Button?

Muscles acheing, and body sagging under the lingering effects of jet-lag, I wiped away beads of sweat and warily contemplated our newly-arrived karting opponents.

They looked like proper Formula One drivers.

A British media v Lewis Hamilton/Jenson Button “challenge” could only be a mismatch, even if one of our more souped-up members did bring his own race suit and helmet to the party.

The past two world champions were certainly considerably better turned out than this reporter, squeezed as he was into ill-fitting overalls with a dodgy fastener that kept bursting open.

McLaren had organised a 50 minute ‘endurance’ test in two-man teams as a warm-up while we waited for two of the fastest men in the world to join us at the indoor track on an industrial estate near London’s Heathrow airport.

Just a couple of stints at no more than 40mph was enough to remind an ageing and unfit hack just how strong real racers must be to manage a full grand prix distance for up to two hours at speeds in excess of 200mph.

Schumacher – The Comeback Part II (or not?)

A lot of people are getting quite excited about the possibility of Michael Schumacher coming out of retirement to race for the new Mercedes F1 team (formerly known as champions Brawn) at the age of 41.

The German’s spokeswoman Sabine Kehm feels it is highly unlikely while Mercedes said at the weekend that “some speculations are nothing but dreams which will not come true” (although note the carmaker did not specifically say this particular piece of speculation was one of them).

Team principal Ross Brawn, who is currently on holiday, has been quoted by Germany’s Bild newspaper as saying that “the media are trying to put together a dream. Michael would have returned to the cockpit for Ferrari, but only temporarily. He has no ambitions to start a new career.”

Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone told the BBC on Sunday that he was “very doubtful” about any such comeback, however appealing it might be.

On the other hand, Kehm told Britain’s Times newspaper on Monday that “I can see a lot of tempting things in it for Michael, but I can also see a lot of non-tempting things. I don’t know.

“It is as it was in August when you couldn’t tell what was going to happen. Then I was convinced Michael would never come back and suddenly all the circumstances were right for him,” she added, referring to the champion’s abortive attempt to return as a stand-in for injured Brazilian Felipe Massa at Ferrari.

A Schumacher comeback has a lot of media appeal — witness all the stories — and not least because McLaren will have two British world champions next season in Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton.

The paying F1 driver is back (but not you, Jenson)

Jenson Button has earned his rewards but he is still one of the lucky ones.

While the Formula One world champion faces the difficult decision of whether to go to McLaren on six million pounds a year or stay with Brawn/Mercedes for what still amounts to a salary of lottery proportions, other drivers are not so fortunate.

With the departure of leading manufacturers and the effects of the global credit crunch, next year’s starting grid will see the return in numbers of a once familiar species that has been almost extinct in recent years — the paying driver.

They may not be obvious, and all will have the mandatory super-licences, but they will be there nonetheless.

Brazilian Bruno Senna, nephew of the late triple champion Ayrton, has the name and the personality to get plenty of attention next year when he races for the new Campos Meta team.

He was also runner-up in GP2 last year.

Despite his attributes, he will still not be getting a salary from the team.

Button to McLaren – the real deal or just pretend?

Jenson Button’s eye-catching visit to McLaren on Friday is of obvious benefit to both parties, whatever the reality behind the headlines.

If a deal is done, the new Formula One champion gets the bigger salary that Brawn are reluctant or unable to pay as well as a potentially winning car for next season.

McLaren would get a line-up of champions that will appeal to global sponsors like Vodafone and show that they remain, along with Ferrari, a big hitting team that can always pull in the top talent.

At the very least, Button is able to send a clear message to Brawn that he has other, viable and possibly more lucrative, options and that they cannot assume he will just stay out of loyalty.

McLaren are similarly able to remind Kimi Raikkonen, until now widely considered the main choice to partner Lewis Hamilton, that they too have alternatives and that he should consider reducing his wage demands.

Raikkonen, their former driver who won the 2007 title with Ferrari and has now left the Italian team, was seen at the factory on Wednesday with his management.

But what if Brawn don’t blink, Raikkonen refuses to accept McLaren’s terms and Button signs up to join Hamilton?

Ricky Rubio and the Sportswrap speed special

Ricky Rubio is the one that got away from the NBA. The number five draft pick opted to spend another year or two in Spain rather than join the Minnesota Timberwolves and FC Barcelona are understandably elated to have got him.

Click the video above to see Rubio celebrate his 19th birthday by helping Barcelona demolish Fenerbahce in the Euroleague. We also take a look at Jenson Button’s homecoming after his Formula 1 world title victory, and why batsmen the world over should be glad a certain Usain Bolt opted for track and field over cricket.

Back next week, same time same place, for more.

World champion Button makes boyhood dream come true

Jenson Button defied his critics and made a boyhood dream come true on Sunday as Britain’s 10th Formula One world champion.

Written off by some in recent years as an overpaid one-hit wonder with playboy tastes, the Briton capped an extraordinary season with a title that ranks as one of the sport’s most astonishing turnarounds.

The 29-year-old Brawn GP driver lined up in Australia in March with just one win under his belt from 153 starts but with a dominant car that he would go on to describe as “outrageous” and a “monster”.

He went on to win six of the first seven races and laid the foundations for a championship that would elevate him to the same level as the likes of compatriots Nigel Mansell and Lewis Hamilton.

Starting 14th in Brazil, with closest rival and Brawn team mate Rubens Barrichello on pole position, the title seemed destined to go down to the wire in Abu Dhabi. (more…)

The same old Felipe Massa?

Felipe Massa won a lot of respect in Brazil a year ago when, having missed out on the Formula One championship by a single point after winning his home grand prix, he proved gracious in defeat.

“I know how to win,  I know how to lose,” he said.

The Ferrari driver returns to Interlagos as a spectator and special guest this weekend after suffering life-threatening head injuries in Hungary in July.

He will not race again until next season, but is on the mend.

Some, however, are asking whether Massa is the man that he was. Not physically, since he has been given a clean bill of health, but in that he appears to have become far more outspoken in his absence.

He suggested early on that Jenson Button was buckling under the pressure of leading the championship — a fair enough point of view — and that he had been ‘robbed’ of the title himself last year by the Renault race-fixing scandal.

How will Button rate as a champion?

Jenson Button needs at most six points to clinch the Formula One title in Brazil this weekend and become Britain’s 10th world champion.

If he does wrap it up at Interlagos, a debate that has been going on for some weeks now will only pick up speed — just how does the 29-year-old rate as a champion compared to all the others?

There are some who hold the view that Button will somehow not be a truly worthy champion, their opinions influenced by the Brawn driver’s inability to assert himself in the latter part of the season.

Some might argue that champions like Michael Schumacher, Ayrton Senna or Lewis Hamilton made their greatness evident from the moment they arrived in the sport.

They could add that someone like Button, who had to wait seven years for his first win and scored a total of just nine points in the 2007 and 2008 seasons combined in a dire spell with now-departed Honda, is surely not on a par with them.

Did he simply luck into a dominant car, thanks to rule changes wrong-footing the usual suspects until halfway through the season, or is he being rewarded for his loyalty to a Brawn team that some were writing off as dead and buried back in January?

There is no arguing that, after winning six of the first seven races, Button has struggled. He finished this month’s Japanese Grand Prix in eighth place and is limping agonisingly to the finish, his early advantage seeing him through.

Anyone still want medals to decide F1 title?

If Bernie Ecclestone had got his way before the start of the season, Jenson Button might have been crowned Formula One champion in Singapore on Sunday.

The commercial supremo’s plan for the championship to be decided by an Olympic-style medals system, with the title going to the driver taking most golds, would have left Brawn’s Button out of reach.

With six wins in the first seven races, the Briton’s tally cannot now be matched by anyone else.

Singapore winner Lewis Hamilton, Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel and Button’s Brazilian team mate Rubens Barrichello all have two wins with three races left.

The only interest in Sunday’s Japanese Grand Prix would have been the constructors’ championship and it is pretty much a given now anyway that Brawn will win it in their first full season.

Brazil and Abu Dhabi, making its debut with what promises to be the most lavish race yet, would have been irrelevant in the grand scheme of things.

As it is, Button has edged 15 points clear of Barrichello and could win the title at Suzuka. But the battle could equally very well go down to the wire as well. There is still plenty at stake.