The Big Interview: Jenson Button

“So what you’re telling me, basically, is that I’m just another turkey on the conveyor belt,” I announce.

“Exactly,” he says, smiling, “but you’re the last on, mate, so you should be all right.”

Button is not an easy interview. “He is about as likely to say something controversial as he is to beat Michael Schumacher to the world championship,” one frustrated writer observed last year. A touch cruel, perhaps, but the boy doesn’t help himself. Humorous, attentive and unfailingly polite, Button has long mastered the art of talking and saying nothing. He doesn’t do anecdotes or forthright opinion.

It is as if every word is governed by “What will the sponsor think?” It is a charge he does not deny.

“In my position you’ve got to be very careful with what you say,” he explains. “When I’m at the circuit on race weekends, I’m pretty much the head of a major manufacturer in motor sport, and we have a lot of very big sponsors.”

But in interviews this devotion can be hard to take. I ask him about the book he is working on and he (very carefully) decides he can’t say too much. I ask him about a recent promotional trip to Shanghai and he (very carefully) declines to identify his hosts. I ask what it is that he most enjoys about his life and he says: “Driving F1 cars, racing against the best in the world and working with a team like Honda . . . and that’s not licking arse.”

“No, it just sounds like it,” I observe.

At a press conference the next afternoon at the circuit, he is joined on stage by fellow drivers David Coulthard, Kimi Raikkonen and Tiago Monteiro. A French journalist raises his hand and asks, “Question to you all: who will win the world championship? Schumacher or Alonso?” The four give the same reply: the championship will basically be decided by the team with the best tyres. The journalist is annoyed. What? No names? No opinions? “We’ve given our opinions,” Button insists. “We can’t see into the future. We don’t know what’s going to happen.”

We meet an hour later and I pull him up on it again. “What was all that corporate crap? Why couldn’t you give the guy a straight answer: Alonso or Schumacher? As a journalist and a fan, I find that absolutely infuriating.”

“Because it’s the truth,” he says. “It will all come down to the tyres.”

“The tyres,” I repeat, incredulous.

“The tyres, 100%,” he insists.

“So why on earth are they paying you guys all this money?” But my frustration soon subsides. Because he’s Jenson. And he’s winning now. And he’s a genuinely decent guy.

THE first session of our interview is abandoned after 40 minutes. He has been worn out by questions about his triumph in Hungary — “How did you feel? What did you do? When did you celebrate?” — and is running late for an appointment for dinner.

The next afternoon we meet again at the circuit and I decide to change settings and increase the revs. The current issue of the magazine F1 Racing carries a brilliant interview with the former world champion Jacques Villeneuve, and I have handed Button an excerpt as we sit in the Honda motorhome.

There’s no hero in F1 any more, says Villeneuve. No one for F1 fans to relate to as a big star. Okay, there’s Michael (Schumacher), but he’s a strange one, isn’t he? I think the problem is that you don’t ever see his true personality. He’s a racer, but a pure racer, nothing but a racer, and because of that, I think the day he hangs up his helmet, people will just forget him.

(Ayrton) Senna, by contrast, will never be forgotten. Some of that is the James Dean factor, of course, because he was killed in action at a young age, but not all of it. I don’t even think Michael will live on in people’s memories as strong or as long as (Alain) Prost has, certainly not as long as (Nigel) Mansell has. Those people attained a hero status that Michael never has and never will.

Michael simply isn’t a great champion because he has played too many dirty tricks and because he isn’t a great human being. Yes, Senna played dirty tricks too, but he did it with more class, more integrity.

“It’s typical Jacques,” Button says, smiling. “He is very outspoken, but some of the things he says are not necessary. The thing is, he’s right when he says that Michael has played dirty tricks and done lots of naughty things in the past, but he’s a seven-time world champion. He has achieved more than any other driver since F1 has existed, so he will be remembered. That is a fact, and it’s very strange to hear Jacques say that. Does he talk about himself being remembered?” “No,” I reply, “but he has lots to say about you. In a separate piece, F1 Racing has listed Villeneuve’s 59 Most Mouthy Moments, and you enter the charts at No 32. I quote: ‘I found that very, very, very weak. A little bit unacceptable’, regarding Jenson Button bad-mouthing him after Australia 2003.”

“Who is saying that?” Button asks.

“He is. You obviously said something bad about him after that race in Melbourne.”

“Yeah, he pitted on the same lap as I did,” Button explains. “He was supposed to come in a lap early but said his radio didn’t work, so he pitted in front of me on the same lap. I had to wait for him to pull away; it screwed my race completely. I said he did it on purpose.”

He watches as I open another page: “There’s more?” “Yes, he’s only getting started,” I reply. “ ‘No 21: Everyone was looking at Jenson with rose-tinted spectacles and I just wanted to open people’s eyes to the facts’.”

“I don’t know what that’s about,” says Button. “But does he mention that I also out-drove him in 2003, or has he left that out?” “No, I think he left that out, but you come in again at 13: ‘Why would another team want to sign a contract with Jenson now, because obviously contracts mean very little to him’. This is a reference to your contractual disputes.”

“Yeah, I’ve heard him say that.”

“Fair point?” “The people I had looking after me were completely wrong,” he says. “And I was guided in the wrong direction, but they can’t take all of the flak. I did make wrong decisions, but I have learnt from them, and in a way, if they hadn’t happened, I might not have won my first grand prix.”

“But it was damaging for you?” I suggest.

“Well, some people thought it was a terrible thing to do, to try to get out of the contract I had with Williams, but it happens all the time in football.”

“That doesn’t make it right,” I aver. “It’s still the baby-in-the-pram syndrome. ‘I want that lollipop. Oh, there’s a bigger one! No I want that lollipop’.

“But otherwise you are never going to achieve,” he says. “It’s either sit there and never win a race, or fight for it and go on to win a race or a championship.”

“But surely your word must count for something?” I argue. “I will race for you. You have my word.”

He pauses for a moment to think about it. “Yes, but it’s not like I walked away from it. We sat down and discussed it and came to an agreement,” he says. “And Frank (Williams) was very happy with it. It’s very different than a lot of people thought.”

“Okay, moving on: ‘No 10: I’ll respect Jenson once he goes quickly out on the racetrack’.”

“That was obviously before I beat him, then.”

“ ‘No 6: Some people spend their life as would-have-beens, could-have-beens, and they end up never achieving anything and that’s what Jenson has done.”

“Fantastic,” he smiles. “That’s impressive of him. Nice of him. I hadn’t seen that one, but that was obviously before the (Hungary) weekend.”

“Doesn’t that piss you off?” I inquire.

“No, it makes me laugh because it doesn’t change anything,” he says.

“It doesn’t change who I am or the way I drive or the way I feel about myself or my confidence at all. As I said, Jacques is a very outspoken person and sometimes he’s right and sometimes he just says it to get a reaction, but it doesn’t work with me at all.”

I close the magazine, raise a white flag and say: “Pity, I was hoping it would.”

JENSON, isn’t he lovely? But how do you cross the line of beauty? How do you reach the man within? Will the real Jenson Button ever reveal himself? Flavio Briatore, the playboy and Renault team manager, tells some interesting stories about Button’s first season with his team in 2001. Clearly struggling to get to grips with a horrible tank of a car, Button had a nightmare season that started with a disappointing retirement in Melbourne and continued to Monaco, where he qualified a lowly 17th on the grid, seven places behind his teammate, Giancarlo Fisichella. When the session ended, he was summoned by his new boss for a little chat. “Jen-son,” Briatore began. “I hear you’re looking around to buy a place down here.”

“Yes,” Button said.

“Well, would you mind not looking around during qualifying!” Briatore has worked with some of the best drivers in the business — Schumacher, Alonso, Trulli, Fisichella — but never quite fathomed his dashing young Englishman. “He was very patient, very calm, very English!” the Italian once observed. “But I wanted to see him get upset and angry. I thought he should lose his temper with us and start making more demands.”

An amateur psychologist friend of mine, a long-time Button observer, has an interesting theory on the wiring in Jenson’s head. It begins with Button’s father, John, and his mother, Simone, on the day when they decide to separate. Jenson is seven years old. John is a talented rallycross driver and a passionate motor sport fan. On the Christmas after the split, he presents Jenson with a gift-wrapped racing kart.

Jenson loves the kart, but mostly he enjoys the bond it creates with his dad. Within five months they are racing. The kid is a natural, gifted, a chip off the old block, and is soon being compared with Ayrton Senna. In March 2000, just turned 20, he becomes the youngest British driver to race in F1.

His new life is everything he dreamt of. With the glory come the spoils: first-class travel, luxury hotels, chauffeured limousines and enough cash to take care of his family. He loves his family. He buys a big house in Weymouth and a fashionable pad in Monaco. His father attends every race, his mother lives with him at home, and life hasn’t been better since he was six years old.

But on the track there are problems. His rate of progression has slowed. He has had good cars, great engines and should be a multiple race-winner, but it is just not happening. Why is it taking him so long to make a podium? When will he win a grand prix? Will he ever win a championship? The jury is divided.

It is April 2005, the closing stages of the San Marino Grand Prix. He is closing the gap to the race leader, Fernando Alonso, but has been stalled in his pursuit by the two Williams cars and is struggling to get through. The Ferrari of Michael Schumacher is suddenly all over his mirrors. Schumacher quickly barges his way through and immediately fillets the Williams.

The experts are bewildered.

“Did you see that?” “Terrible.”

“Why did he surrender so easily?” “It’s his nature. He’s just not ruthless enough.”

“Are you joking? Did you ever see his father drive? John would never have conceded.”

“Yes, but what if Jenson inherited the character of his mum? What if behind the polished exterior, he was really quite vulnerable?”

WE ARE back in the Honda motorhome and I’ve decided to present my theory to Button. “What if I was to suggest,” I begin, “that you’ve spent your entire life living for other people?” “No,” he says.

“Your dad is crazy about motor racing, so you become a racing driver?” “My dad is crazy about racing and I become a racing driver,” he corrects.

“Your parents split when you are seven years old and you’ve spent the past 19 years trying to keep the peace between them?” “Yeah, that is quite true.”

“You buy a nice pad in Monaco and a boat because that is what drivers do?”

“So, who was that trying to please? The people I bought it from?”

“You’ve always been in places you don’t particularly want to be?”

“That’s not correct. Everything about my life I have loved. It’s not true that I live my life for other people. I might care for other people, and try to help them out. For example, my parents didn’t get on so well a few years back and I’ve always tried to keep the peace between them because they’re people I love. That’s normal in families.

“But when it comes to my racing career I’m very driven and very selfish. People who are around me at races will know that I’m a different person here (at the circuit) than in my personal life. I completely blank people at races. I need to be focused. I’m rude.” “How rude?” I ask. “Because I find that hard to believe. Give me an example of Jason Button being rude.” “Well, it’s not swearing or anything. I just ignore people.”

IT IS a Friday afternoon at Istanbul Park. The second free practice session for the Turkish Grand Prix has just ended. Button has set the third-fastest time and I have joined the Honda team in the pits as he steps from the car. He removes his racing helmet and unzips his fire suit. His face is red from the effort and he is gesturing towards the front of the car to one of the engineers. They have had a slight problem with the car during the session. I am studying his face for a wrinkle of irritation. Can Jenson do nasty? Will he be rude to his engineers? There is no indication so far. After a brief discussion, he turns to take his leave and we make eye contact as he heads towards the door. I want him to blank me. I want him to stride straight past. I want to see some killer instinct. He winks.