Jenson button · Biography

In November 2008, Honda announced its withdrawal from Formula 1, leaving Jenson Alexander Lyons Button without a team for the following season. Ross Brawn rescued the Brackley operation, renamed it Brawn GP, and Button won the 2009 World Championship with it. Born on 19 January 1980 in Frome, Somerset, the British driver raced seventeen seasons in Formula 1 between 2000 and 2017. Along the way he drove for Williams, Benetton, Renault, BAR, Honda, Brawn GP and McLaren.

Karting years

His father, John Button, had competed in rallycross, and Jenson started karting as a young boy. In 1991 he won the British Cadet karting championship. Over the following years he raced across Europe, and in 1997 he became European Formula Super A champion, the youngest winner of that category at the time. That run of results opened the door to single-seaters, at a time when Formula 1 teams were starting to look closely at drivers coming out of karting.

From Formula Ford to Formula 1

He made his single-seater debut in 1998 and won the British Formula Ford championship, along with the Formula Ford Festival at Brands Hatch. That same year he received the McLaren Autosport BRDC Young Driver Award. In 1999 he raced in British Formula 3 and finished third overall. He tested for Williams late that year, and Frank Williams picked him for 2000, when he was just twenty. He made his debut at the 2000 Australian Grand Prix and scored his first point in the second round, in Brazil, by finishing sixth.

Benetton, Renault and BAR

In 2001 he was loaned to Benetton, a tough season in an uncompetitive car. He stayed with the team when it became Renault in 2002 and scored points on several occasions. In 2003 he joined BAR, the Honda-powered outfit. In 2004 he reached the podium ten times without winning a race and finished third in the championship, behind the two Ferrari drivers. In 2005 BAR was excluded from two races over an irregularity involving the fuel tank.

Honda and a first victory

Honda took over the team for 2006. That year, at the Hungarian Grand Prix, Button started from fourteenth and won in the rain. It was his first Formula 1 victory, at his 113th race. The 2007 and 2008 seasons were very poor for Honda, with a car far from the front. In December 2008 the Japanese manufacturer left the sport amid the economic crisis, and Button's future was suddenly uncertain.

The Brawn GP title

Ross Brawn bought the team and entered it as Brawn GP with Mercedes engines. The BGP 001, with its double diffuser, dominated the start of 2009: Button won six of the first seven races, including Australia, Malaysia, Bahrain, Spain, Monaco and Turkey. Red Bull closed the gap in the second half of the year, but the Briton managed his lead. At the Brazilian Grand Prix he climbed from fourteenth on the grid to fifth place and sealed the 2009 world title, while Brawn GP also took the constructors' championship.

Seven seasons at McLaren

For 2010 he joined McLaren alongside Lewis Hamilton and won in Australia and China in his first months with the team. In 2011 he had his best year at McLaren, with three wins and second place in the championship. One of those wins came at the Canadian Grand Prix, where he dropped to last place and still won on the final lap of a race that lasted more than four hours because of rain stoppages. In 2012 he won in Australia, Belgium and Brazil, which was his last victory. He stayed with McLaren through the Honda-powered years from 2015 and stepped away from full-time racing at the end of 2016. In 2017 he returned for a single race, the Monaco Grand Prix, standing in for Fernando Alonso. He left Formula 1 with 15 race wins.

After Formula 1

In 2018 he raced in Japan's Super GT series with Honda and won the GT500 title alongside Naoki Yamamoto. That same year he took part in the 24 Hours of Le Mans with SMP Racing. He was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in 2010.