Barrichello: Brawn should have fought to keep his drivers

Despite the fact that Mercedes now owns controlling interest in the team and wants two German drivers in their cars, Rubens Barrichello has suggested that Ross Brawn should have ‘fought’ to retain the drivers who helped to lead the ex-Honda F1 operation to double world championship glory in 2009.

Between them, Barrichello and teammate Jenson Button triumphed eight times over the course of 2009 – and on only six occasions did neither of them make the podium. However, Button was not offered a good contract because Brawn wanted him to jump ship to make room for 7-time world driving champion, Michael Schumacher (rumored) and has elected to jump ship to join Lewis Hamilton at McLaren-Mercedes next year where he will get eaten alive. Barrichello was also forced out and will extend his own record-breaking F1 career into an incredible 18th consecutive season at Williams.

Despite many musing that the seeds of his own parting had already been sown as early as his post-German Grand Prix outburst at the Nürburgring in July – in which he emotionally and publicly accused the team of ‘making me lose the race’ – Barrichello insisted that his Williams switch was motivated by a desire he had held since his youngest days, when the Grove-based concern was regularly at the sharp end of the field. Barrichello’s hero and countryman Ayrton Senna competed for Williams in 1994, the year in which he was tragically killed at Imola.

“My decision was taken early," explained the eleven-time grand prix-winner. “It was a childhood dream to drive a Williams, so I signed the contract very rapidly."