Formula 1 News

Barrichello threatens to quit if Ross Brawn favours Button 

Brawn GP’s Brazilian driver Rubens Barrichello, has threatened to quit Ross Brawn’s team if he finds out that the team is favouring his team-mate Jenson Button, winner of the 2009 Spanish Grand Prix thanks to a switch in the Brazilian’s pit stop strategy.

“If I get the slightest sniff that the team are favouring Jenson, I’ll hang up my helmet tomorrow,” stated Barrichello to Speed Tv. “I need to find out what happened. I’m sure everything is ok. I know that Ross would not do something similar.”

“Ross asked me to drive for him and he knows that I want to compete fairly with Jenson,” he added.

Team orders are a highly sensitive issue for Barrichello, who back in 2005 left Ferrari after being instructed not to compete against his team-mate Michael Schumacher.

Asked during the Spanish Grand Prix post race press conference if he feared that a similar situation could happen now with Brawn GP, the Brazilian said: “Well, I’m very experienced with that, and if that happens, I won’t follow any team orders any more. I’m making it clear now, so everybody knows.”