Jenson Button has admitted he is happy to have won the inter-team battle at McLaren in 2011.
After his critics said he was entering the “lion’s den” at the British team by pairing with Lewis Hamilton last year, Button has become the only driver in his teammate’s F1 career to beat him in the end-of-season points standings.

“It’s great to get more points than a teammate who is so competitive,” he admitted after sealing the achievement in Abu Dhabi on Sunday, despite Hamilton winning.

“You have to win races, you’ve got to get more points than your teammate, consistently do a good job on race weekends,” he added.

The duo are now tied on wins in 2011 with three apiece, and one race remaining in Brazil next weekend.

“I know them both well enough that they will want to be the driver who comes out of the year with four wins,” said their team boss Martin Whitmarsh.

But for the second time in recent days, Hamilton disagreed with his boss.

“That’s not the case,” he insisted. “We both want to win, but it doesn’t matter whether he gets it or I get it. We still end up on a high. That’s my view.”

And as for the inter-team battle, Hamilton added: “For me it’s irrelevant if he (Button) has finished ahead of me because we want to win the championship.”

Instead, he hopes to bounce back from his personal problems in 2012, by reinstalling a comfort “bubble” around him at grands prix in the form of his mother and brother.

“It was great having my mum in Abu Dhabi,” said Hamilton. “It is difficult with my brother because he is racing all the time, but I would like to have him here more often.”

Former McLaren driver and lead BBC commentator Martin Brundle admits he is not sure why that is so important to Hamilton.

“Frankly, I don’t understand this concept that family and friends can or should make a difference to your on track performance,” he said, “but I’m from a different generation and I never experienced the spotlight and pressure that the likes of Hamilton do.”

 Sebastian Vettel has revealed one of his greatest joys is receiving a “nice trophy” on the formula one podium.
Also a collector of his numerous winning helmet livery designs, the back to back world champion admitted on Monday that taking home a new “cup” from a grand prix is better than mere money.

“I could give up anything, but not the trophies,” said the 24-year-old, who in his 80 F1 races has won 21 times and stood on 35 podiums.

“When you’ve put everything into it for two hours, whether you are rewarded with a big or a small cheque really doesn’t matter — but a nice cup makes a difference,” he told SID news agency.

“When I stand up there (on the podium), I know life for me could not get much better.”

Next month in India, Vettel will once again be presented with the official drivers’ championship trophy — and it’s the one that the German is not allowed to keep.

The only way to keep looking at his name on the most important cup of all, then, is to keep the championships rolling.

“I have to give it back (eventually),” said Vettel, “so it would be great to have it for several years … Michael (Schumacyer) had it for five in a row.

“My ultimate goal has always been to be formula one world champion, and now no matter what happens in the future, it can’t be taken from me.”

 Kimi Raikkonen has taken yet another step towards signing with the Williams team for 2012.
At the end of an intense weekend of speculation regarding the 2007 world champion’s possible return to formula one, Finn Raikkonen’s managers duly appeared in the Abu Dhabi paddock.

The appearance of managers Steve and David Robertson was all the more notable given Raikkonen’s participation thousands of miles away in the Welsh rally.

And Turun Sanomat newspaper reports that they watched the grand prix from within Williams’ hospitality area.

The signs are growing stronger every day that 32-year-old Raikkonen is definitely motivated to return to the sport that gave him 18 wins between 2001 and 2009.

Sir Frank Williams finally confirmed to the Finnish broadcaster MTV3 on Sunday that his Oxfordshire based team “has strong interest” in housing Raikkonen next year.

“Obviously, anyone worth his salt in any business will argue about the price of things,” he grinned, “so there is an argument going on, which of course is quite normal.

“I must choose my words carefully by saying only that it (Raikkonen coming to Williams) is possible.”

And team co-founder Patrick Head confirmed in Abu Dhabi that Williams’ interest in the former McLaren and Ferrari driver is not new.

“We were interested in Kimi when he drove for Sauber,” the Briton is quoted as saying. “We proposed to our then partner BMW to make him an offer but they thought it was too much money.”

 Pirelli will investigate the tyre problem that caused Sebastian Vettel’s only retirement in an otherwise almost flawless 2011 season.
Having started from pole and spun at the second corner of the race, the German’s Red Bull was badly damaged by the time he got the shredded tyre back to the pits.

Pirelli announced that the “sudden deflation” will be investigated.

“It certainly seems to be a very unusual incident and we’ve already been to look at the place with Sebastian: there seems to be no reason that is immediately obvious and the set of tyres was one that he had already used for qualifying,” said motor sport director Paul Hembery.

Indeed, Vettel reported that he had driven over the same kerb in the same way numerous times during the weekend, and Lewis Hamilton – who was immediately behind the 24-year-old at the time – also said he saw nothing unusual.

“I assumed it was just a tyre failure,” said the Briton.

Hembery is not so sure.

“There are so many possibilities for why a tyre can go down, but we are not going to find out right now (in Abu Dhabi) because of the limited resources that we have here,” he told Auto Motor und Sport.

And after eventual race winner Hamilton’s run of on-track incidents recently, his boss Martin Whitmarsh let out a sigh of relief when he saw the Vettel replay.

“We were a bit worried that Lewis had hit him and so it was a bit of relief when we could see clearly that he was far away from him,” the McLaren boss smiled.

In the Red Bull camp, Dr Helmut Marko saw the incident as a golden opportunity lost.

“That would have been an easy victory,” he said. “Hamilton and Alonso were not so impressive.”

 Only three current F1 drivers can win grands prix without sitting in the best car.
That is the claim of McLaren test driver Pedro de la Rosa, who hailed Lewis Hamilton’s return from poor form to win the Abu Dhabi grand prix on Sunday.

“I had the feeling he always had a few tenths in his pocket, and his pace on the hard tyres was very strong,” the veteran Spaniard is quoted by EFE news agency.

“For me, Hamilton, Vettel and Alonso are the only drivers who can win grands prix without having the best car on the grid,” added de la Rosa.

A happy Hamilton said after winning on Sunday that beating his old nemesis Fernando Alonso made the victory feel even more special.

“I think it was one of my best races. I said that to myself as I slowed down, just being able to hold off one of the best drivers in the world throughout the race is something that is very, very tough to do,” said the Briton.

Alonso’s second place, meanwhile, means the Ferrari driver has now collected a trophy from every circuit he has ever raced on in formula one.

“I have them from all the circuits that I have raced on in formula one … so now I have completed all the circuits,” he smiled. “So, (I’m) happy.”

 Lewis Hamilton declared himself “ecstatic” on Sunday as he looked to put his miserable 2011 season behind him.
But while the 2008 world champion – who has been in a depressed mood at recent races following his split with girlfriend Nicole – won in Abu Dhabi, his McLaren teammate Jenson Button had arguably a bigger reason to smile.

Third placed Button, wearing a “Movember” moustache this weekend and without the use of KERS in the race, sealed the lid on the 2011 McLaren points battle as he can no longer be beaten in the standings by Hamilton.

Fittingly in F1′s quest for ultimate glory, the Briton said he was “relatively happy”.

Indeed, with the real title battle over, it was the fact Hamilton began to put his personal “bubble” back together rather than the actual race win that had him so happy this weekend.

“This weekend I feel fresh and I have a clear mind. Racing is a mental thing and, if you think you are ready, then you can move forward,” he said earlier.

Not going forward on Sunday was Red Bull’s Vettel, whose bad day started when he discovered that one of his heroes – Paul McCartney – had left Yas Marina before he could meet the former Beatle.

Then, from the front of the field on the opening lap, he suffered a rare retirement.

“We need to find out why, maybe I cut the kerb at a funny angle,” said the German, after the flailing tyre from the surprise puncture badly damaged the suspension on the way back to the pits.

Lewis Hamilton has tipped Nico Rosberg to retain his edge over Michael Schumacher at Mercedes.
Rosberg, a former karting teammate of 2008 world champion Hamilton and now a F1 rival, has signed on for the next few years with the German team, where in 2010 and 2011 he was the standout performer alongside the great Schumacher.

“I know Nico very well,” Briton Hamilton is quoted by the Cologne newspaper Express, “and I knew he would do everything to beat Michael. And he did it.

“I think he’s going to keep that gap now. Nico is hungry, there is no doubt about that. He has not won the championship or even any races but he is still young.

“When Michael was in the same phase in his career, maybe he had the same hunger and he won seven world championships and 91 races.

“I don’t think it’s possible for him to be as hungry as he was before,” added Hamilton.

But while there is no doubt Schumacher has upped his game in the second half of 2011, some commentators still believe he should return to retirement at the age of 42 and open his cockpit for a new charger.

Gerhard Berger, an early contemporary of Schumacher’s ultra-successful initial career, does not agree.

“He has won seven world championships and earned the right to do what he wants,” the former Ferrari and McLaren driver told Kleine Zeitung newspaper.

“The market regulates itself and if he was not good enough still, he would not still be there.”

Dr Helmut Marko has bad news for the FOTA alliance and the next inter-team resource restriction agreement (RRA).
Red Bull, accused of not sticking to the existing cost-limiting deal, is not signing the new one that is currently on the table.

“It is totally full of holes. Anyone can simply circumvent the rules. So we are not signing that,” the team’s consultant Marko is quoted by Bild newspaper.

The paddock pressure on Red Bull is rising, with some rivals complaining loudly that the potential collapse of the FOTA group is a huge risk amid the worsening Eurozone crisis and ahead of the crucial talks over the next Concorde Agreement.

“It’s the same for every team when they are at the top. But we just have to do what we can to stay there,” insisted Marko.

For instance, off the track in Abu Dhabi, contrary to Red Bull’s real wishes, the highly controversial blown exhaust rules were further tightened ahead of 2012.

The trick was pioneered by the team and said to be a great part of Sebastian Vettel’s dominance this year.

“So, without the exhaust we just have to come up with something new,” said Marko. “And we’ve got Adrian Newey.”

The Briton is working hard on the dominant RB7′s successor.

“I expect that it will be ready for the first test in Jerez,” said Vettel, referring to the opening 2012 pre-season event in February.

“At the moment we are on schedule,” he added.

Christian Horner insists he is not worried that pieces of a current-spec Red Bull front wing are currently sitting in the lounge rooms of fans — and possibly elsewhere.
After Mark Webber’s Monza crash, fans collected up the carbon fibre pieces of the mysterious and highly effective Adrian Newey-penned component.

“No problem. You can’t get any sensitive information from small pieces like that,” boss Horner is quoted by La Stampa newspaper after being shown newspaper photos of the wreckage in a Spanish spectator’s home.

It had been suggested that some of the other pieces had been delivered by ardent Ferrari fans to Ferrari’s Maranello headquarters, preceding the debut of a remarkably similar ‘flexing’ wing that is currently being tested by the famous team.

A Ferrari official is quoted as rubbishing the theory.

“If someone is able to understand from wreckage how something works, study it and put it into a design and build it and all of this in a month, that would not be formula one but something that does not exist,” he said.

 Bernie Ecclestone could be planning to pull $100 million out of the coffers to give the negotiations over F1′s next Concorde Agreement a kick-start.
In 2005, amid the teams’ threats that they would give up on the income offered by formula one and set up their own series, Ecclestone pulled off a masterstroke by paying Ferrari $100 million to sign up.

Ferrari was selected by the F1 chief executive due to its arguably indispensible value to the sport, and indeed the breakaway threat duly folded.

Now, seven years into the future, talks about the period beyond 2012 are getting set to move into high gear.

The difference this time is that the teams are united under their FOTA umbrella, even though Ecclestone would love to see the current disagreements over a cost-cutting agreement result in the union’s split.

However, with breakaway threats believed to now be strictly prohibited, the teams’ new tactic could be the suggestion of an involvement as co-owners of the lucrative commercial rights.

“On my side, we have certain obligations not to speak about sensitive subjects. Any kind of declaration we may make can be used and – let me put it this way – manipulated for the wrong reasons, so I would say that I cannot comment on that,” said Ferrari team boss Stefano Domenicali in Abu Dhabi.

But after the shock cancellation of a key FOTA meeting this weekend, rumours are rife.

“What is being said among members of the teams is that, as he did in the past, Ecclestone could make an unique offer to renew (the Concorde Agreement) between Ferrari and FOM,” O Estado de S.Paulo correspondent Livio Oricchio wrote.

“If FOTA ceases to exist – and the chances of this seem high – and Ferrari accepts an offer from Ecclestone, the others will feel obliged to negotiate as well. History will repeat,” he added.

Kimi Raikkonen’s most recent teams think Sir Frank Williams would be wise to sign up the 2007 world champion for next season.
For his part, 69-year-old Williams remained calm amid the waves of speculation in Abu Dhabi, refusing to let slip the status of the talks with the former Ferrari and McLaren winner.

“I cannot make any comment about supposition, sorry to be so unhelpful,” he told reporters.

McLaren boss Martin Whitmarsh, however – now the head of Raikkonen’s Woking based employer between 2002 and 2006 – was emphatic when asked what advice he has for Williams.

“Try and sign him,” said the Briton. “I hope that he (Raikkonen) is hungry.

“I am sure he hasn’t lost the capability to thrill us so I think it would be fantastic for formula one,” added Whitmarsh.

“I wouldn’t ordinarily presume to advise Sir Frank who he should sign but I think it would be exciting if he did.”

Another man in Abu Dhabi who knows Raikkonen well is Stefano Domenicali, team boss at Ferrari, the Finn’s last F1 team and the scene of his title triumph.

“I know Kimi very well,” said the Italian. “He is very talented, very strong, he was the last driver to win the world championship with us and he will want to show he is still one of the strongest.”

Amid all the speculation about the identity of his 2012 teammate, it seems clear that Pastor Maldonado can relax about keeping his race seat at Williams.

Rubens Barrichello, Adrian Sutil and – to the delight of F1′s rumour mill and headline writers – Kimi Raikkonen are reportedly in contention for the Oxfordshire based team’s second seat.

But although Venezuelan rookie and last year’s GP2 champion Maldonado has not yet been officially confirmed for 2012, boss Sir Frank Williams admitted in Abu Dhabi that the heavily backed 26-year-old can relax.

“I am sure Pastor will be in one car,” he said at Yas Marina.

In some quarters, Maldonado is still dismissed as little more than a pay-driver, with his PDVSA sponsorship and personal support from Venezualan president Hugo Chavez said to run into the dozens of millions.

But when asked who he thinks is this year’s standout rookie, Fernando Alonso told AS newspaper: “I like the season that has been done by Maldonado.

“He is usually always fighting with Barrichello or beating him and doing some pretty serious racing. I think he has done very well in his debut,” said the Ferrari driver and former back-to-back world champion.

Ferrari is still working to solve the ‘fluttering’ problem with Felipe Massa’s new 2012-style front wing.
The Red Bull-like wing – apparently designed to pass the aerodynamic load tests but still flex towards the track – was observed violently oscillating at high speed in India two weeks ago.

The Italian team said it had fixed the problem for Abu Dhabi but in the Friday practice sessions Massa’s wing was still ‘fluttering’ and sending up spectacular sparks when the extremities bottomed out.

“The reality is that we found something that was not correct in terms of the structure of that wing (in India) but apparently it seems that there is still a problem,” admitted team boss Stefano Domenicali.

But why isn’t the problem similarly affecting Fernando Alonso’s sister car?

“I have got engineers much more expert than me here that know that an effect on a wing can depend on a lot of issues, a lot of things,” said Domenicali.

“It depends on the setup of the car, depending on tyre pressure and so on. Maybe it is a combination of all these elements for our engineers to understand and react as it is not what we would like to see,” he added.

On the bright side, Massa said he was not aware of the problem until he saw the television replays.

And Ferrari is also happy to have encountered the problem now, before the crucial 2012 pre-season test period.

“We would have lost an entire week of testing,” an unnamed team member confided to Auto Motor und Sport.

Texas officials would not comment when asked if Bernie Ecclestone’s implication in the Gerhard Gribkowsky corruption scandal might endanger the 2012 US grand prix.
It is feared that, with the F1 chief executive admitting in a German court this week to paying millions to hush the beleaguered banker, the Texas government might rethink contributing to the Circuit of the Americas project.

The Austin American Statesman newspaper posed the question to the Texas comptroller’s office.

“All of these questions would require us to speculate,” the office replied by email.

It is a similarly difficult time for many involved in F1. The Telegraph’s Tom Cary, who has been reporting from Munich, said the sport’s owner CVC “is understandably nervous about its name being dragged through the mud”.

And “the whole of formula one will be watching with interest to see how this case unravels,” he added.

Formula one bosses have called off a crucial meeting in the paddock of the Abu Dhabi grand prix.
Ahead of the tricky Concorde Agreement negotiations, and amid the unknown future of the cost-cutting agreement and the entire FOTA alliance, the bosses had planned to get together at the Yas Marina venue.

“The crucial meeting was cancelled at the last minute and moved to Brazil,” reported Auto Motor und Sport.

The German report said the decision was made by FOTA chairman Martin Whitmarsh because Red Bull, suspected by some rivals of breaching the existing resource restriction agreement, made a last-minute proposal for the next cost-limiting deal.

“One has to wonder whether Red Bull filed its proposal very late so as to cause the postponement,” the article reads.