Jenson Button completed the London Triathlon this weekend with a personal best time of two hours and seven minutes.
The British F1 driver was taking part in the triathlon to raise funds for the Make a Wish Foundation and was competing alongside his Brawn GP race engineers Peter Bonnington and Andrew Shovlin.
The London Triathlon consists of a 1500m swim, 40km bike ride and 10km run.
I think I’m going to collapse now,” joked Button after the event. “I didn’t push too hard in the swim as I have done before and I got it done in 24 minutes so I’m very happy.
“I was massively quicker than I expected on the bike, one hour and three minutes, and then I took the first lap of the run relatively easy before giving it the beans on the second lap to finish in 35.02 minutes.
“I feel really good. There was only one thing my trainer failed on. He told me not to fill my water bottle up to the top because I wouldn’t drink it all but I got halfway round and it was completely gone, so I struggled a bit there.
“People think they sit in a truck and push buttons while I sit down and drive a race car, which they think is easy, but this proves that we do train a lot. “I pushed myself to the limit in the triathlon and it is different to driving a car for a start my heart beat is a lot higher when I’m swimming and running.
“But when I’m racing the lactic acid builds up through the vibrations and all the G-forces make it very tiring.
“It’s great to do this for F1 because it shows how much the drivers have to train and that we don’t just sit there and turn the wheel.”
Button had a little help from the rest of the Brawn GP team too. He borrowed the Team s wind tunnel in Brackley so that his engineers could hone his aerodynamics whilst cycling.
“The team were looking at aero for the Tour de France and asked me if I wanted a go,” Button said. “It was good because Ross Brawn came over to have a little look – he was a cyclist back in the day. I’m very lucky because I have had a lot of help.”
