ISTANBUL // Such has been their dominance that Felipe Massa says the Brawn GP team should already be crowned Formula One world champions - after only six races. Jenson Button has won five of them, gaining 51 points out of a possible 55 to give him a commanding 16-point lead over his teammate Rubens Barrichello. The Red Bull driver Sebastian Vettel is a mammoth 28 points further behind in third place. With Brawn looking almost unstoppable in every race so far, Massa admits it is difficult to see beyond them as the constructors' kings. A third and fourth place finish in Monaco for Kimi Raikkonen and Massa has revived Ferrari, but the Brazilian said: "I'm not the kind of guy who gives up very easily, so I'll fight until the last corner of the last race, but, in my experience, Brawn will be champions. It's impossible to believe that they are going to lose the championship. For me it's already over. "Mathematically it's still possible, but it's quite difficult. For me, it's quite difficult to believe that Brawn will not score points anymore. They have a really competitive car with which is easy to score points. So even if we win as many races as possible, they are going to be there."
The only question remains whether the veteran Barrichello can overhaul Button. That does not seem likely according to Fernando Alonso. The two-time world champion believes the Englishman could be celebrating his first title within six races. "There is a possibility that if Jenson continues winning, the championship will be mathematically over after 12 or 13 races," he said. "I think it's good for him, obviously, but it's a shame, because it has been very nice to see the last two championships decided in the last race. That was quite good for the sport and the spectators, as people love this type of fighting.
"This year, I'm not saying is boring, but you know ... In the end, the best wins, and Jenson has been by far the best in the first part of the season and if he continues at this level he will be champion very soon. "It is the best car, there is no doubt. It's very good aerodynamically, it's very good mechanically, with good grip, because they can really attack the kerbs. They have a very strong car, they have finished all the races with both cars." Button is not taking anything for granted and focused on his immediate objective, rather than his future. Brawn are keen to tie him down to a lucrative new contract to ward off any potential suitors following his fine form this season.
But Button said: "It's not something that I'm going to talk to the team about until much later in the season. "I'm having a great time, but I know that it could end very quickly if you take your eye off the ball. So that's not what I'm going to do. "I haven't spoken to anyone about it. I've read the articles and that's about it. Even after reading the articles I haven't spoken to the team about it because I'm not interested. I'm here to race and I don't want to talk about money.
"I don't want to talk about anything else. It's irrelevant at the moment. I've got to concentrate on this weekend, and that's what I've got to do at every race we go to. I'm not thinking about money at all. I was with this team and continued with this team because I thought the car would be competitive, that's all. "I'm very happy, I'm doing what I'm here to do, and that's winning races and leading the championship. I'm not thinking about next year yet." He is also not of the opinion that the title is in the bag just yet. "We've had six races and I've only got a 16-point lead. It's not a lot," he added. "If nothing changed now it would only be two races before the end of the season when I would have won it, and there's so much that's going to happen before then. "It's definitely not going to be a walk in the park. You can see that by the competitiveness of the other teams. If you look through all the data after the races, their lap times are the same as ours, we've just done the better job on the weekend. But they will get it right, for sure. But hopefully not too often." akhan@thenational.ae
