Looks like it has been finalized, if Alan Henry of Guardian is to be trusted. Only the mere 'formality' of signing remains. £6m-a-year deal, the financial reality has set in as far as driver's wages are concerned.

Jenson and Lewis will make a strong pairing. Good for Mclaren to have two British drivers too, as they try to become the British version of Ferrari.

Goodbye Kimi?

As much as he's got the charisma of a wet fart, i wish him all the best with whatever he does
(watch him of signed a 4 year deal with merc)

Good for him. Hope Nick gets the other Mercedes.

But do hope Kimi is able to find a berth as well.

Virgin? Closest thing to a Hesketh probably

NOT SIGNED YET

Good for British McLaren fans. Lewis will beat Jenson though.

One thing though, with Merc going to Brawn, isn't it a step down to join McLaren? Yes, i understand McLaren's history but Mercedes money and knowledge in the hands of Brawn and co will do wonders I think.

He could be making the biggest mistake of his career or the most inspired decision

Time will tell

True, true. But would Alan Henry allow himself (and Guardian) to be used like this by Jenson's management? I don't think so. He sounds confident and definitive.

He's close to Whitmarsh apparently

a little too eager to start a new thread arent we?

not going to happen.

It's quite clear who's behind all this - that fat French DJ.

Now he doesn't have to choose anymore between the HAM and the BUT entourage

Then that means he hasn't signed at all, which means he has not joined McLaren.

After his performance at Ferrari (and seeing that Ferrari are paying him to leave!), any F1 team will be wary of signing Kimi on such a long binding contract. Expect a one year (plus a second year's extension) type of deal, if he gets one at all.

Last I checked Mercedes are still at McLaren. Brawn showed this year it doesn't need Mercedes knowledge. Not much of a logical argument I'm afraid, McLaren will still have more resources to deploy this year than Brawn who had to scale back significantly after Honda disappeared ; as was shown this year in bringing a car from the back to the front of the grid. Unless there's a double diffuser waiting to be found arguably McLaren are ahead of Brawn.

You dont give up, i thought you said Kimi had already signed with McLaren You changed your tune pretty fast

Wake up! He is going to Red Bull

AH's often written about McLaren, including a couple of books IIRC. He's as close to a McLaren insider as a jouno will ever get.

I'm going to laugh if it's not true. I didn't expect this, I always thought it was going to be Kimi. But Button is cheaper and bring #1 back on the cars so it's good choice. :

Yes but you can clearly acknowledge that pretty much all of Mercedes interests will be with their own team, they will only meet any contractual obligations they have with McLaren and most of that is simply regarding engines etc.

Relax, Kimi can still buy a race seat at Force India, if he is interested in racing that is.

Let's see. I've a good feeling Kimi is getting signed soon.

Which is what powered Brawn to two World titles (i.e. WCC and WDC)

no i havent.i still believe hes going to mac

I'm sorry, but I just don't understand how Button can have signed on for McLaren without officially signing anything. He has not officially joined McLaren until he inks a contract.

well im sure all you kimi defenders will come up with an excuse if kimis management fails to get him a contract

Perhaps there is an MoU before the actual contract is signed, and Alan Henry just couldn't resist claiming the scoop.

From Mclaren's point it makes sense to leak this via one of their journalist links, does it now? They lose a partner in Mercedes, so immediately announce that they are 'stealing' the WDC from the new Mercedes team.

Indeed. Anything could still happen, but I think the chances of him signing are now extremely high. So the situation for us has changed, but it's still not final.

Maybe, but as far as I'm concerned, this is just like Alonso and Ferrari: the Spanish press were reporting Alonso had joined Maranello as early as the Bahrain Grand Prix. Ultimately, the were right. He did join. But when Ferrari announced it, they made a point of highlighting the fact that Alonso had only become an option for them in the few days before the announcement was made. The Spanish guessed that he would go to Ferrari, which means those early articles were not accurate at all. It's the same deal here: Alan Henry is only speculating. And it will remian speculation until McLaren and/or Button come out and publicly declare it all.

Well, when you reach agreement, you sign.

Because until you sign, you don't actually have an agreement so you're unsafe. What they have probably is a document to read, based on a verbal agreement, which can come unstuck on any word.

Ah, the fat bastard! It all makes sense now

Yeah, he will go to mercedes/brawn now if that is true

Edit: kimi that is

WUT

Now that BrawnGP becomes the official Merc team and the car is even better than last year Jenson jump ships to the enemy territory ?

What are you thinking ?

Not true.

"Mercedes hope to keep hold of Button"

"Mercedes will bow to Ross Brawn's wishes and negotiate to keep the world champion Jenson Button as a driver next season, a team source has confirmed."

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/motor-r...on-1821779.html

That article you linked to is old news. Alan Henry's article is fresher. And he would not be so definitive if there were any doubts in his mind.

From your link

"There has even been a suggestion that McLaren held talks with Button as a warning to Hamilton's father and manager, Anthony, not to try to renegotiate his son's existing £50m contract, which still has three years to run. Ross Brawn, however, has no such doubts, and has always remained optimistic Button would stay."

There's always more than one way to skin a cat.

You're wrong. The Guardian article is dated Nov. 16 while the Independent one is dated Nov. 17, so it is fresher than the one you cited.

I suspect it is not just money, but how many years each team was willing to offer. Mercedes allegedly only wanted a one year deal to 'evaluate' Jenson and likely replace him with Vettel or another driver. Mclaren have offered him a three year deal. No matter how slow/fast he is compared to Lewis, it secures his future in F1.

Let's watch that again in super-slow motion:

Alan Henry: posted Monday 16 November 2009 22.00 GMT
Richard Rae: Tuesday, 17 November 2009

Do you want to re-think your statement?

im getting more and more confused.i hope we have an announcenent soon,jenson/kimi.i hope kimi does not leave f1

the thread is going to look even more idiotic once button resigns with brawn in a few days time

I could be. I am still convinced about Jenson's move to Mclaren though, it has Alan Henry's voice behind it. The independent article reads like one of those filler pieces. Does Richard Rae have any sources or leads at Mclaren?



Yes.
(Though it is possible that Richard Rae's article was published later, but Alan Henry wrote his later. )

I know how you feel mate, my heads spinning

Who's Richard Rae? Isn't David Tremayne The Independant's main F1 journalist?

the indepedent article contains nothing new, it simply refers to a quote made earlier in the day about Mercedes wanting to be an international team. The guardian story contains fresh information (whether its accurate or not, I don't know). Frankly the date of publication is rather irrelevant if you read the content of the stories.

No, The Guardian contains pure speculation. So I'd say we're at an impasse.

Given that Raikkonen is arguably at least one of the top 4 drivers available, and that his asking salary is lower than it otherwise would be due Santander's buyout of his Ferrari contract, I'd say Button's going to McLaren means that Raikkonen is sure thing for driving a year at Brawn. I start to believe now the rumours that Raikkonen is just hanging out for 2011 at Red Bull.

As great admirer of both Ferrari and McLaren when they're at their best, this is a disappointment for me because (a) I think Domenicalli and whoever else been making the calls at Ferrari lately have been slowly but surely letting Ferrari's greatness slip away ever since ~2006. I'd like someone higher up to realize this and turn things around as soon as possible, but I fear that without eye-openingly good competition next year Ferrari will just continue as they have. (b) I think Button will be only marginally, if at all, better than Kovalainen whereas a Hamilton/Raikkonen set of drivers would have meant practically guaranteed contructor's and driver's titles.

Naturally, if it's indeed true that Raikkonen will be available to Brawn (ie Haug and Brawn have indeed pulled off a trick in getting him out of McLaren), then I think that's great for Brawn but somewhat of a waste since I think the funding for the vast majority of the development for next year's car has been conducted under conditions of tremendously lower resources than the team will have had either in the past or the future (ie during period when had no Honda money and no Mercedes money).

Anyway, I'm really starting to believe the Raikkonen to Red Bull rumors for 2011. And that'll certainly be interesting. But disappointed not going to see a SuperMcLaren next year to get Ferrari's ass back in gear.

i hope so

You actually believe the line that Fernando was only an option a few days before the announcement was made! Wow. What's that joke about gullible not being in the dictionary.

Either way, it's definitely put a spanner in the works for Kimi at McLaren. Kimi's side has been too quite for far too long, I would not be surprised at all if Jenson has signed a deal with McLaren. Of course that means a seat would technically be opened at Brawn (aka Mercedes GP)...but aren't there rumours of Nick maybe going there...Nick and Nico at Mercedes GP/Lewis and Jenson at McLaren. Nice.

As for Kimi fans blaming Kimi's management - to a degree that is the place to point the finger, but some of the blame would be squarely on Kimi's shoulders.

Of course nothing is final yet....

Even after they were shot down months ago by Red Bull?

I agree.

Lets wait until the telegraph publishes a story at 3:15am to get an even more up-to-date story which we won't be able to substantiate until someone somewhere in real life signs a real contract and tells us all about it with their own mouths.