2009 Brazilian Grand Prix

Apparently Vettel's poor qualifying showing was in part due his car being in a dry-weather set up. Hopefully that means that although he was poor in qualifying and will do better during the race today, as it seems it will be in the dry. Ideally a lot of folks in front of Vettel are on wet-weather set-ups, which should make them slower relative to Vettel's Red Bull.

And Button's father's wearing the pink shirt again. I guess he wears the pink shirt on race-day, but not necessarily on Saturdays for qualifying.

Quite the eventful first lap. A lot of cars got taken out. Still unsure whether Vettel emerged completely unscathed. Looks like he almost got hit by Kovalainen, but right now it seems that they didn't make contact. I'll keep you updated. Vettel's currently running in 11th, and Button's in 9th. Barrichello's still 1st.

And Kovalainen drove out of his pit box with the fuel hose still attached. He ended up spraying fuel all down the pit lane. And then Raikonnen ended up driving through it, and causing a pretty impressive fireball. I guess thank goodness for all the safety gear those guys are driving. Still, its gotta be pretty terrifying...

And really nice passes by Kubica and Button on the restart from the safety car. And then another really nice pass by Button on Nakajima. Button is freaking flying. Seems he's finally gotten his head out of his own posterior, and showing the form from the beginning of the season when he was absolutely flying. If Button clinches the championship due to this race, I'd be a lot happier than if he did it based on his performance in the last few races.

Now Vettel needs to get around Nakajima, and then Button. And then the rest of the field. So, get on that...

And now Heidfeld seems to have just run out of fuel due to a screwed up pit stop. Some bad luck for Heidfeld lately. You might remember from Singapore how Sutil ramming Heidfeld ended Heidfeld's 41 or so consecutive Grand Prix string of finishing every race. And now he's retired from 2 of the last 3 races.

And some sweet racing and passing and stuff between Championship-leader Button and Toyota driver Kamui Kobayashi (or whoever you spell that), who is racing in his first Grand Prix. In fact, this is quite possibly one of the best F1 races I've seen in a while, in terms of racing and overtaking.

Looks to be a pretty good race for Mark Webber today, though. Not that it matters in terms of the championship.

And now Nakajima crashes heavily to be the 6th car to retire from the race. This is getting sort of ridiculous.

And another nice pass by Button.

And Vettel finally gets around Button on lap 57, after a very quick pitstop. Vettel's chances are pretty much nil at this point, but getting ahead of Button seems to have helped give Barrichello a chance, although, as it runs right now, Button will still clinch the championship today. Although, Barrichello just had a puncture in his tire, which necessitated another stop. Looks like his goose is cooked as well.

So, looks like the championship is decided in the Brazilian Grand Prix for another year. Sadly, this year, its no longer the last race of the season. We'll see what happens in Abu Dhabi next week, even though nothing is on the line.

Another good win for Mark Webber, for the second of the season, and the second of his career.

Overall, a good race in terms of racing. Not so good a race for Vettel's championship. Mainly because its over.

And some rather hilarious singing of "We are the Champions" over the radio by newly crowned World Champion Jenson Button. The same Jenson Button who is damn near unintelligible over the radio. I'm quite impressed that is race engineer is able to communicate with him. All I really understand is just random honking. Which, I guess means that 2009 is the first season where the World Champion was part goose.

And sadly, it looks like none of the championships will be won by the prettiest car on the grid (the Red Bull RB5), and all will be won by the ugliest (the BrawnGP BGP001). Tis a shame.