2009 Spanish Grand Prix

Championship standings

Button leads by 12 points from teammate Barrichello, with Barrichello one point further clear of Vettel. Brawn lead the Constructors’ Championship by 22.5 points from Red Bull, who are a further point ahead of Toyota.

Previous race

Button won in Bahrain from fourth on the grid, overcoming the front-row Toyotas with better strategy and tyre management. Vettel was second, Trulli third. Hamilton took a season’s best fourth in McLaren. Alonso suffered severe dehydration after a drinking-water pump failure, losing 6 kg during the race.

Entrants

Spain is widely anticipated as a development restart, with most teams arriving with significant new parts. Brawn GP make their first upgrades to the BGP 001. Ferrari introduce a two-tier diffuser on the F60 and run KERS on both cars despite earlier reliability problems. BMW Sauber bring a major aerodynamic overhaul — new nose, revised front wing, sidepods, rear wing, and a lighter chassis — and drop KERS entirely to make the most of the weight saving. Force India also shelves KERS plans to focus on aerodynamic development.

Following Kovalainen’s heavy crash here in 2008, the FIA has modified the run-off at turn nine: the far side of the gravel trap is raised by 1.5 metres to create a graduated upward incline, the gravel trap itself has been renewed, and the tyre barriers have been reinforced.

Tyre choices

Bridgestone brings the soft and supersoft compounds.

Practice

Button was fastest in FP1. Rosberg topped FP2 ahead of Nakajima and Alonso. In FP3, Ferrari led the way with Massa ahead of Räikkönen — the Brawn cars were over half a second slower in third and fourth. Räikkönen failed to make it out of Q1 in qualifying, later admitting he misjudged whether his first lap time was good enough to advance.