Jenson Button has ‘no regrets’ after final race

Button retired from Formula 1 at the end of the 2016 season as a world champion, 15-time winner, and one of the most prominent stars of his generation.

His post-Formula 1 career, in which he participated in all types of racing but most notably in endurance racing, was not marked by the same highlights. For example, Button did not win Le Mans, unlike his former McLaren teammate Fernando Alonso.

Also unlike Alonso, Button will not be remembered as one of the greatest Formula 1 players of all time. But that doesn’t mean he wasn’t capable of greatness, he was.

His world title with Brawn in 2009 is one of Formula 1’s greatest fairy tales.

The team seemed headed for chaos when Honda’s owner pulled out of Formula 1 at the end of 2008. But team boss Ross Brawn knew the car they had built was good, and struggled to keep the team alive through the winter.

Six wins in the first seven races followed, and although Button had a major upswing in the second half of the season and did not win again, he rallied in time to clinch the title after an impressive comeback in Brazil.

Button had the courage and confidence to move to McLaren in 2010 to take on Lewis Hamilton, and he acquitted himself well, scoring more points during their three seasons together, even if Hamilton was undoubtedly the superior driver overall.

It was during that era that Button’s greatest performances came, most famously his stunning win in Canada in 2011, when he raced from last to first in the final 30 laps of the longest Grand Prix in history.

There were other times when he was at a level above his rivals, often in mixed conditions, when he had an almost supernatural sense of changing levels of grip.

As an overall group, he did not have the depth of skill and consistency that Hamilton and Alonso had. But at his best, he could beat them fair and square. Very few can say that.