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Re-born Button Praises New Start with Brawn GP

Jenson Button feels like a re-born F1 driver following the scare of not making the F1 grid he had to survive this winter. Now that Ross Brawn has finally secured a place in the 2009 F1 roster, the Englishman looks at racing a bit differently. Especially since he was one of the front-runners during his first official outing with Brawn GP's BGP 001 in Barcelona on Monday.

“I wouldn't say that in the last few years it all went a little bit stale, but when something happens like that it's like 'Wow!' It does become a fresh start and getting into an F1 car makes me feel like a kid again. It's so exciting. It feels like 2000 again but with nine years experience. It's the perfect position to be in,” said Button after yesterday's testing.

The British driver topped the morning session at Circuit de Catalunya on Monday, but eventually ended the day with the 4th best time. He did so while doing the fewer laps out of the entire pack of teams, which provided a boost for the technical staff at Brackley. Although many see them as back-runners in 2009, Button believes the new car is highly competitive and praises its “feel” on track.

“I have the hunger to achieve. I'm not the only person that feels like that, it's all of us. Especially having produced a car that I think is competitive and is very different to the last two cars we've produced. So we all feel like kids again and you can see that from the smiles on peoples faces in the team, and that's before we drove the car today.”

“Certain areas are not as good as other teams, but we started this car very early and we have produced one that is competitive. And watching everyone testing, we are looking at the cars and seeing that certain parts that we have tried on our car, didn't make it go that much quicker so,” added Button.

Jenson is due to test the BGP 001 for another day on Tuesday, after which he'll step aside and hand the new machinery to teammate Rubens Barrichello for the last 2 days of testing. Although this is the last group test of the off-season, it is believed Brawn GP will conduct one more test until the season opener in Australia.
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