Well you know me, Lewis Hamilton running through my veins 
But Jens undoubtably has a skill set that cannot be ignored. In the right circumstances, with the right car and conditions, Jens can be sublime. But for me Lewis will always have the edge, he can drive round problems and with the changing handling of the car due to the fuel situation, I think he'll be ahead convincingly. On the other side of the coin, jens's smooth style will suit the tyre situation.hey wot fun ahead!!!. But Lewis..easy
I don't mean to pick on you but how does JB have a skill set that can't be ignored? He didn't win a race for his first 7 years in F1. (Started in 2000, first win in 2006 at Hungry) He's participated in 172 races and has only won 7 times. That's not exactly a high level of skill. While at the beginning of the 09 season he was on fire, as the other teams began to make progress with their cars, he didn't accomplish anything. JB didn't win his championship on skill, it was luck.
Okay...I don't mean to bore you...But you asked for this. Time for a lesson. Are you sitting comfortably? I don't care, I'm starting anyway.
Jenson Button was one of the finest karters in his generation and some say one of the best ever. He had one season for example where he won every event he entered. Jenson was a hero to a bunch of karters younger than him, because he was winning everything. One of those karters was a kid called Lewis Hamilton - who happened to race a kart with an engine prepped by JB's dad for a while.
After Karts, Jenson did some British Formula Ford. Unsurprisingly, he was fast. Very. He immediately graduated into F3. Now here is where you need to start paying attention. Lewis Hamilton is a good point of comparison, so I'm going to be using him. In F3, Jenson was running in what you could call a satelite outfit. It was affiliated to one of the major teams, but it was separate. He was a race winner. But the money was running out.
Lewis never had this problem. Lewis had gained support from Ron Dennis which took the financial strain of him and his father. Jenson and John were going it alone, trying to get by with sponsorship from Sutton Motorsport Images. Jenson did not have the cash to set a top-tier operation up around him and lacked the access to the top teams Lewis later enjoyed thanks to McLaren's help.(At this stage I want to make it clear this is not a dig at Lewis, it's just two different way racing careers can advance).
So, having done some F3, Jenson really needed to advance or else the money was going to be a major problem. At the time, the next rung on the ladder was F3000, which begat GP2. F3000 of course is the dumbass name given to what was essentially F2. You probably know all this, but I couldn't resist a dig at the stupid name. Awful, awful name (And yes I do know what it means). Anyway, Jenson tried out an F3000 with a view to racing in the series.
The problem was, Jenson did not suit the F3000 car. he had had a similar issue with a Karting series several years prior which was running tyres which were like poison for his driving style. It's not uncommon in motorsports for drivers to simply not suit a series. Look at Piquet Jr. He's not the greatest driver in the world, but he's better than the performances he turned in in F1. Likelihood is, he doesn't suit F1. Jenson had the same problem with F3000.
So they were in a bind. Opportunity knocked with Jenson's McLaren test - the Young Driver of the Year Award prize he won. It put him on the F1 radar. From there, he was offered tests with Prost (He bested Jean Alesi, day one) and then Williams. Both teams were impressed - and Williams wanted to consider him for a 2000 race seat. This solved the problem. Jenson had fallen off the motorsport ladder when F3000 had proved nonviable - entering it would have damaged his reputation, but not entering was equally as likely to do some damage to his career. The Williams offer allowed him to bypass F3000 and thus keep his career alive.
One problem. As Jenson now admits, and despite the reporting of the British media at the time, he was not ready for F1 in 2000. Luckily, the Williams car was decent enough, so it served as an adequate learning environment and Ralf Schumacher was a useful asset as he was experienced and talented (No, really, Ralf may have gotten arrogant later, but he did have skills. Not Michael's, but they were there). Second problem. Montoya was signed to do 2001 in the Williams.
So Jenson had to jump ship. Unfortunately for him, Flabio was the one who picked him up. Briatore dumped the inexperienced, young Button into the Benetton B201. The B201 is one of the piss-poorest F1 cars ever produced by a reputable outfit. It lacked Power Steering - and wound up injuring Jenson's shoulder - handled abysmally and was a bitch to set up. The thing stank out loud. Fisichella was more able to get around this than Jens, because he had more experience & maturity (And a non-injured shoulder). Contrast with Lewis in 2008 - one of the best cars on the grid, more time to prepare for F1, more experience in F1 cars. Apples and oranges.
Button stayed with Benetton as it became Renault and beat new teammate Trulli in 2002. The R22 was no world-beater, but Jenson very nearly managed a Podium (Mechanical failure denied him). Jenson helped build the Renault team up from the Benetton 2001 ashes. But Flavio wanted his man Alonso in. And Trulli was contracted for 2003, Jenson wasn't. JB got turfed by bad timing, and Alonso was the one who reaped the reward at Renault.
So Jenson joined Villeneuve's BAR, which Dave Richards was trying to remake into a team worth a damn. Jenson was a vital part of that process. 2003 he bested Villeneuve and made the team his own as Jacques departed early. He lead that team to 2nd in the Constructors' the next year - narrowly missing wins on three occasions including once at Monaco by a tiny margin and once at Germany where, but for a grid penalty, he would have won by a lightyear from Schumacher. And all that in the season where the Schumacher/Ferrari package was at its best.
Before we move on, that brings us to another point. Throughout most of JB's F1 career, only 2-4 teams have been consistent race winners in any one season. Jenson was never in one of those teams at one of those times. F1 back then was miles less competitive than it is now. It was typical for field spread to approach 5 seconds.
Now for 2005 of course Jens was going to move back to one of them - Williams. That fell through, so it was then going to happen in 2006. That fell through as well when Jenson finally managed to avoid what had plagued his F1 career up till that point - right move, wrong time. Be it entering the sport too early, or joining Benetton/Renault too early, you can probably see timing was screwing JB over - a lot. Only the BAR move was time right. So why was Jenson's overturning the second Williams move so wise? They lost the Beemer - and the rest is history.
Anyway, 2005/6 brought mixed success, including that first win. From that race to the end of that season, Jens was the top scorer. For the majority of that year (2006) Honda had had a pretty average (In some cases outright bad) car. Jenson was signed until the end of 2008 - Honda considered him a major asset prompting people like me to start calling him "Mr. Honda" and him to start making dodgy Japanese TV Ads you can find on YouTube and laugh at (They're effed up, yo).
Of course, the Honda outfit under Honda's corporate overwatch was pretty mediocre. Blame culture seeped in, and mistakes started being made. So 2007 and the RA107 arrived. Jens struggled through. Then 2008 and the RA108 arrived and...Well it was hell for Jens. The light at the end of the tunnel was 2009. Ross Brawn had arrived and was pouring everything into that campaign. The RA108 was mediocre at best, and more suited to Rubens. Development got frozen without any tuning to suit Jenson more. So Jenson tootled on miserably but diligently, signed a three year deal for 2009-2011 with the team and the season was written off as pointless.
We all know what happened next. Jens stuck around, the team came good.
Jenson, after 10 years, got back on the ladder by winning the Championship. You call it luck, but luck alone does not beat drivers like Rubens Barrichello like that. Jenson made hay while the sun was shining, then managed the gap to become the first driver to win ahead of the final round since 2005. There are some drivers still scratching their heads about how Jenson beat them so badly in Turkey and you ask Lewis, Sebastian, Buemi, Kobayashi and the other drivers Jenson flew past on his way there if they think "luck" is how he got past them.
Here's a hint: they don't.
Jenson hasn't got a high level of skill? Baloney. You've just not been paying close enough attention. Jenson's skill has been masked by circumstance and timing. It was there from the start and its there now.
Class dismissed.
The Frome Flyer: Smoother, Smarter, Calmer,
Winner.
Jenson Button: Professor, Chauffeur, World Champion Racing Driver.
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- By darwin dali