Formula 1 News

Honda: Jenson Button to quit if team doesn’t improve 

Jenson Button said earlier this morning that he will quit Honda if he doesn’t see performance improvements in Honda’s 2008 season car. Button won his first Grand Prix in 2006 after more than 100 starts and 4 years with the Brackley based team, but this season’s package was notoriously poor and Button scored all of the Japanese giant’s meagre tally of 6 points. “The car was a complete dog, and I’m just not interested in racing like this any more,” Button told the Mail on Sunday. “I’d love to win the title with Honda but I’ve got to start winning, and if I don’t then I have to be ruthless,” he added.

Button told the newspaper that an option on his long term contract allows him to “sit down and discuss the future” at the end of 2008, presumably if Honda does not meet certain performance targets. Jenson said: “It things don’t work out, that’s exactly what I’ll be doing. I’m not saying I expect to win the title, but I do expect a dramatic improvement.”

Button’s frustration was compounded this season when Lewis Hamilton, the British media’s new ‘golden boy,’ entered Formula One and immediately challenged for the championship with McLaren. But despite saying the 22 year old should be “sick as a dog” for stumbling at the final hurdle in 2007, Button insists that he has no hard feelings for his fellow Briton. “If I’m not winning, I don’t give a damn who else is. It doesn’t make any difference to me if I’m not in a competitive car,” he said. “I can’t be bothered with working my nuts off and qualifying fourteenth any more. It’s making me unhappy,” Button added.

source: GMM