Published March 30, 2009

A-list performance from the three Bs

By STEVE SLATER

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FORGET the financial recession. Forget the pre-season politics. Forget, for the moment at least, even the deliberations of the FIA Stewards, the claims, counter-claims and protests by some of the teams. Where it matters most, on the race track, the 2009 Australian Grand Prix delivered a stunner of a race.

Dream result: Brawn GP's Button (centre) and teammate Barrichello (right) celebrating with team boss Brawn, after their stunning win on debut at the Australian F1 at Melbourne yesterday

In what has to be the feel-good story of the year so far, 'the three Bs' - Brawn, Button and Barrichello - delivered a dream result. The Brawn GP operation, which only announced a month ago that it would be able to contest the 2009 World Championship, frankly trounced their opposition in practice and qualifying, locked out the front row of the starting grid, then dominated the race to score a 1-2 on the team's debut.

Back in the early 1990s, I met the veteran German racing driver, Karl Kling, when he was demonstrating a historic Mercedes Benz 'Silver Arrow' Grand Prix car at the Nürburgring. The proudest moment of his life, he confided, was with Mercedes, when he followed the legendary Juan Manuel Fangio home in the 1954 French Grand Prix, to score the first-ever 1-2 victory for a team making its Grand Prix world championship debut.

Fifty five years on, I never dreamt that I would see history being repeated. One can assume that Ross Brawn, Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello feel a similar sense of pride and fulfilment.

It should be remembered of course, that the story behind this performance began long before Brawn GP was created. Over the past few years, immense resources were invested in the team by Honda. The team won its first Grand Prix in 2006, with Button in Hungary. Then it went on a slide, dogged by wind tunnel problems, ill-handling cars and management infighting.

The Brawn GP operation, which only announced a month ago that it would be able to contest the 2009 World Championship, frankly trounced their opposition in practice and qualifying, locked out the front row of the starting grid, then dominated the race to score a 1-2 on the team's debut.

Former Ferrari man Brawn became Team Principal in late 2007, too late to influence the design of their 2008 car, which proved an even more spectacular underachiever than its predecessors. Early in the 2008 season, Brawn took the decision to effectively abandon all further development on the Honda RA108. It left Button and Barrichello trailing at the back of the field, but crucially it meant that Honda, now Brawn GP, would have nearly a six-month headstart over their rivals on developing a car for the new 2009 rules.

It is that car, ironically no longer bearing a Honda badge and now powered by a Mercedes Benz engine, that took the Brawn team to victory in Melbourne.

'The BGP 001 car is the result of 15 months of intensive development work and the team have been nothing less than fantastic in their commitment to producing two cars in time for the first race,' said Brawn in the lead-up to the event.

'The facilities we have here are among the best in the sport as a result of multi-million pound investments over the past 24 months. We have a fantastic workforce and a car that could be one of the best. We've had all the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle for some time, now may be the time they fall into place.'

Boy oh boy was he right. One key area of course, which had Brawn's rivals howling with indignation, was his team's interpretation of the rules regarding the shape and size of the underbody 'diffuser' which generates downforce at the rear of the car.

I believe that the team has merely done what good teams have done for years. They have cleverly exploited a loophole in the new aerodynamic regulations in order to generate greater downforce and therefore grip.

The Brawn diffuser is a 'double decker' design. The 'U'-shaped centre section visible between the cars' rear wheels is simply the lower deck. An upper deck is formed by the car's chassis and is a few centimetres higher than the diffuser height limit of 175mm. This extra area is critical in gaining downforce, but in the letter of the rules is not officially part of the diffuser.

While this area will remain the focus of debate in future races and in an FIA Tribunal once the F1 circus gets back to Europe in early April, I thought Barrichello's comment in the post-race press conference was particularly noteworthy.

In contrast to Button's drive to victory on a relatively clear track at the head of the field, Barrichello's race to second place was done the hardest possible way.

First, he nearly stalled on the starting grid, then as he slipped down the order into the first corner, he was hit by Heikki Kovalainen's McLaren, pushing him in turn into the BMW of Nick Heidfeld. Barrichello's Brawn picked up more battle scars when he clashed with Kimi Raikkonen's Ferrari, then narrowly avoided the melee which eliminated Sebastian Vettel and Robert Kubica, promoting him to second place as the cars finished behind the safety car.

'I never thought I could finish on the podium after the start, I hit anti-stall and recovered quickly, then I was hit from behind by a McLaren and that put me sideways and I hit someone really hard,' said Barrichello. 'If people think our car is only good because of the diffuser, that big hit broke the diffuser completely, so the car was strong without it.'

Guess which team I'll be backing for another win in Sepang next week? You got it!