Sunday: First victory of the season for Jenson Button and McLaren!
After qualifying its two drivers in the top two positions on the starting grid, the McLaren team started the 2012 championship perfectly. Jenson Button, starting 2nd, managed this Grand Prix masterfully before claiming victory for the 13th time in his career. His teammate Lewis Hamilton, who had secured pole position, finished on the third step of the podium.
Jenson Button – 1st
Each victory holds significant meaning, but this one shows us how important the winter has been. The starts in the last two seasons were both difficult, but today it’s a very encouraging performance and the team from Woking has truly done an extraordinary job! This victory means a lot to me but also to them. The work will be even more interesting now that we know we can do great things with this car!
At the start, I wanted to get through the first two laps quickly to avoid the threat of a DRS, but it wasn’t easy because Lewis was right behind me. The race went well overall, but I was very worried at the end when the safety car came out, as I had a 10-second lead at that moment. It was 6 p.m., the sun was setting, and it was quite hard to maintain tire temperature during the Safety Car period. I then managed to get out of the DRS zone quickly and avoid Vettel. Everything went perfectly well until the end.
Many positives can be taken from this weekend: we have a very good car and we can fight for the world championship! Additionally, it’s a perfect start to my season and I’m already looking forward to being in Sepang.
Lewis Hamilton – 3rd
« I would first and foremost like to congratulate Jenson and the entire team for this great result today. It’s quite disappointing not to convert a pole into a victory, but I know there will be other races and many more opportunities to score more points.
I had a bit of a hard time today and it wasn’t my day. However, we experienced a very fast race and that’s the most important thing! This has a huge positive effect on the whole team.
I don’t know what happened at the start: I lost ground, then suffered from tire degradation at the end of the first stint. At the end of the race, I wasn’t able to close the gap with Vettel because he was very fast on the straights, which made overtaking difficult. Then, Webber put a lot of pressure on me.
I will now refocus my mind on the upcoming race.
Martin Whitmarsh – Team Director of Vodafone McLaren-Mercedes
Jenson was brilliant today. He got an excellent start, passed Lewis, and managed the race smoothly. Lewis also drove very well even though he was deprived of second place when the safety car came onto the track. Of course, we would have liked to finish one and two, but this result is very good compared to the start of previous seasons, so we will be content with that!
By the end of the season, there is still a long and difficult road ahead. But we have started in the best way and we will try to do the same in Sepang.
I would therefore like to thank the entire Vodafone McLaren Mercedes team, as well as the members of Mercedes AMG HighPerformancePowertrains for their fantastic effort over the past few months. We have worked very hard and all this labor paid off this afternoon.
