F1 Watchalong: Canadian GP 2011 with Jenson Button
Written by News on 12/06/2020
It was the Grand Prix that Jenson Button shouldn’t conceivably have won yet extraordinarily did, and the longest race in Formula 1’s history. The 2011 Canadian GP had it all – and is the dramatic subject of our latest Sky F1 Watchalong.
What we’re billing as the Race of the Century – so far! – is undoubtedly the most famous of Button’s 15 career wins as he overcame a mountain of setbacks to overtake Sebastian Vettel on the final lap to claim victory – more than four hours after the race had started.
Nine years on and Button is taken back to that very wet and very long Sunday afternoon in Montreal in the company of Martin Brundle, Ted Kravitz and Paul Di Resta – who was racing in his first season of F1 with Force India.
Button admitted: “This was basically [summing up] my whole career in one grand prix. The adrenaline, the highs and lows, through this race were beyond anything I’d experienced – or experienced since.
“In four hours of racing, so much went wrong and this really helped me mentally with the rest of my career.
“Times do get tough and this really showed me if you keep your head down you can come out the other side of it.”
Watch at 9pm on Friday night on Sky Sports F1 – and online via YouTube and Facebook.
Button: ‘The greatest comeback of my life’
Button, two years on from his world title triumph with Brawn, was in his second season at McLaren alongside Lewis Hamilton and heading to Canada was fourth in a Vettel-dominated championship, nine points adrift of Hamilton.
He qualified only seventh in a disappointing qualifying for McLaren but the elongated race provided sufficient twists and turns that nobody was counted out.
Starting behind the Safety Car, Button and Hamilton controversially collided inside the first three laps of green-flag racing in battle down the pit straight – with the latter McLaren retiring – and Jenson then picked up a drive-through penalty under the second Safety Car that was called as a result a few laps later.
The race was red-flagged completely on lap 25 when the heavens absolutely opened over the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve and so ensured a two-hour suspension to the race.
Button resumed in ninth place but soon hit trouble again – colliding with another fellow world champion, this time Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso, at the second chicane. The incident pitched the Spaniard out of the race and punctured Button’s tyre – prompting another pit stop and dropping him to the rear of the field.
Almost lapped, how could Button win from there? What followed was one of the most miraculous in-race comebacks in F1’s history as Button, thanks to a relentless charge back through the field, hunted down race-long leader Vettel into an unforgettable final lap…
The Formula 1 season will begin on July 3-5 live on Sky Sports F1 with the Austrian GP. The race is the first of eight in 10 weeks in Europe, with every race live on Sky Sports.
(c) Sky Sports 2020: F1 Watchalong: Canadian GP 2011 with Jenson Button
