Buttons not slowing down

Jenson Button mastered Monacos treacherous streets to chalk up his fifth victory in six races and lead another Brawn GP one-two finish.

Formula One championship leader Jenson Button mastered Monacos treacherous streets on Sunday to chalk up his fifth victory in six races and lead another Brawn GP one-two finish. The Britons sixth career victory,in an untroubled drive from pole position on a sunny afternoon,stretched his lead over team mate Rubens Barrichello to 16 points with 11 races remaining.

Button,who took the chequered flag 7.6 seconds clear of the Brazilian after a masterfully smooth performance around a bumpy and twisting track lined by metal barriers,has 51 while Barrichello has 35.

Yeah,Monaco baby,yeah, the local resident,who had laboured among the back markers in recent years with an uncompetitive Honda,yelled over the team radio after his third win in a row.

The only mistake he made,after 78 laps at the wheel,was to park his car in the wrong place after taking the chequered flag. He climbed out of the car and ran along the straight from the pit lane,waving at the fans and jumping for joy.

Finlands Kimi Raikkonen,who had started on the front row but lost out to Barrichello at the start,took third place for champions Ferrari in the Italian teams first podium finish since the last race of 2008.

Mercedes-powered Brawn,heirs to departed Honda,have now finished one-two three times in the most astonishing debut season the championship has witnessed in 60 years of competition.

The performance of the team this year is definitely going to go down in history, said Button,the first Briton to win in Monaco from pole since Jackie Stewart in 1973. Its been staggering.

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Barrichello grained his tyres in the first stint and also had to contend with a loosening seat belt.

McLarens world champion Lewis Hamilton,who started last on the grid after crashing in qualifying,was 12th.

Button became only the seventh driver to win five of the first six races of a season,the last being Germanys seven-times world champion Michael Schumacher in 2004. Reuters

Fisichella misses out

Giancarlo Fisichella came agonisingly close to scoring Force Indias maiden points before eventually finishing ninth,while his German teammate Adrian Sutil came in 14th.

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For the second successive year,Force India experienced heartbreak at Monaco as Fisichella,running eighth after 53 laps,dropped down and finished just outside the point bracket.

Last year,it was Sutil who was running fourth here with four laps to go when Kimi Raikkonen crammed his Ferrari into the Force India car to end his race.

Fisichella was up in 11th after 28 laps. By lap 40,he had cut through the midfield clutter to rise to ninth. With Heikki Kovalainen crashing after 53 laps,Fisichella was among the points at eighth place.,but couldnt hold on.