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Featured Sport News

Brawn lead changing of guard

Author: Brandon Barker
Date: 17/04/2009

On and off the track Formula One has enjoyed a renaissance in the first few weeks of the new season, with new championship favourites Brawn GP making a stunning start to their time in the sport.

Jenson Button won in both Australia and Malaysia to take an early lead in the drivers' standings, while his team were boosted further in the week as their controversial rear diffuser was ruled legal by the FIA.

Englishman Button had previously won just once in 155 GP starts before the 2009 campaign, but he and team-mate Rubens Barrichello have been the leaders of the pack in recent weeks.

Button's exploits have pushed compatriot and reigning world champion Lewis Hamilton into the background, but his McLaren team have been making most of the headlines away from the pits.

Long-standing team boss Ron Dennis quit his post this week, ending a 40-year association with the sport, while sporting director Dave Ryan was axed after a stewards enquiry following the racing in Adelaide.

On the track, Hamilton has been well off the pace and he looks highly unlikely to be able to forge any meaningful defence of his crown.

Toyota duo Jarno Trulli and Timo Glock look the men most likely to ruin Brawn's dreams of success on debut, but any true indications of the battle are hard to judge.

Brawn totally dominated from start to finish in Australia, but rain at Sepang meant that the second race of the campaign was one that didn't really show the progress made by any of the teams.

One thing is for sure, the Ferrari garage will be a tense place to be this weekend, with neither Kimi Raikkonen nor Felipe Massa having earned a single point so far this season.

Their struggles and those of McLaren mean that there really is a changing of the guard in the sport, leading to a welcome level of uncertainty in the outcome of the campaign.

Double world champion Fernando Alonso's Renault has also looked like a work in progress so far, but the Spaniard has still managed to secure four points and could yet emerge as a contender to complete a hat-trick.

The 2009 race is only the sixth in China, with Barrichello, Alonso and Raikkonen having all tasted glory at the Shanghai International Circuit, while Hamilton emerged victorious a year ago.

Of that quartet, veteran Brazilian Barrichello will go into the weekend with the best chance of a second triumph, but he will somehow have to find a way past team-mate Button to do so.

However, both McLaren and Renault are both set to use new diffusers similar to those of Brawn and Toyota, meaning that its anybody's guess who will lead the way in China.

F1 chiefs will be delighted, with the action again set to be unpredictable for the watching punters.

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