BRILLIANT BUTTON WINS WORLD TITLE

JENSON BUTTON was crowned world champion at Interlagos after Rubens Barrichello suffered a nightmare race.

The championship leader moved into an unassailable lead by finishing fifth with home favourite Barrichello slipping from pole position to eighth, suffering a puncture after being overtaken by Lewis Hamilton.

After a poor qualifying session in the rain, British ace Button showed his overtaking skills again in Brazil, moving up from 14th on the starting grid, to ensure the chase for the title is over with Brawn GP also securing the constructors' championship.

Jarno Trulli and Adrian Sutil crashed out on the first lap and looked like coming to blows on the track, and Fernando Alonso was one of six drivers to retire, while Kimi Raikkonen survived a flash fire in the pits during a dramatic race to finish in sixth spot.

Australian Mark Webber won the Grand Prix for Red Bull with Robert Kubica in second, Hamilton third and Sebastian Vettel fourth but the spotlight was elsewhere with Button rightly taking all the glory.

Button celebrated by belting out Queen's classic hit 'We are the Champions' from his car and was sportingly congratulated by Barrichello afterwards.

It was a remarkable race, even if the home crowd did not get the result they wanted, with Barrichello now overtaken by Vettel in the drivers' championship after slipping through the field.

Emotional

"It's really amazing," declared Button. "My voice has gone now.

"After the last few weeks I've had, this one makes up for it. It was such an awesome race. I'm world champion, baby!

"That deserved it, that race.

"21 years ago, I jumped in a car and I love winning. I never expected to be world champion in F1.

"You think racing drivers are born different to you but I've done it today."

Team manager Ross Brawn was very emotional, adding: "It's still got to sink in. It's going to take a while. It's very special."

Stunning

Red Bull's Webber grabbed the win ahead of BMW Sauber's Kubica, the Australian ending a run of five successive races without scoring a point.

Hamilton was a stunning third from 17th on the grid, with Vettel fourth, Button fifth, Raikkonen sixth in his Ferrari and Sebastien Buemi a fine seventh for Toro Rosso.

HUG: Button is elated after the race

It was a stunningly dramatic start to the race as Toyota's Trulli and Sutil of Force India almost came to blows after a first-lap collision that them sent both crashing into retirement.

Attempting to pass Sutil around the outside, Trulli put a wheel onto the grass which sent him spinning into the back of the German's car.

As Trulli struck a wall, Sutil went careering across the infield, his momentum taking him back onto the track where he was struck for a second time, on this occasion by Renault's Fernando Alonso, who was also forced out of the race.

Trulli angrily confronted Sutil but Sutil said: "I think it was quite obvious he was on the outside and he lost control of his car and crashed into me.

"It was very strange he came to me and blamed me for the incident because he just crashed into me."

The accident brought out the safety car at the end of the first lap which culminated in more drama in the pit lane.

Heikki Kovalainen had been caught up in an incident with Ferrari's Giancarlo Fisichella at the back of the field as they made their way through the initial Senna S.

Fellow Finn and 2007 world champion Raikkonen, starting from fifth on the grid, had also had his problems as he had sustained a broken front wing and left-rear puncture in a separate issue.

With both forced into the pits, Kovalainen exited with the fuel hose still attached to his car and as he made his way down the pit lane, the stray hose sprayed fuel onto Raikkonen's car directly behind him, causing a flash fire.

Raikkonen came through it unharmed, whilst Kovalainen pulled over outside the Brawn garage where the mechanics removed the hose.

In all the mayhem, Button had moved up from 14th to ninth by the end of a first lap led by Barrichello, who had made a clean getaway from pole.

The 29-year-old put in a charge, swiftly passing Renault's Romain Grosjean and Williams' Kazuki Nakajima, who later suffered his own drama on lap 31.

In attempting to pass Kamui Kobayashi, Nakajima hit the left rear tyre of the Toyota debutant.

Nakajima was fortunate his car was not propelled into the air as it momentarily reared up before crashing back down.

He then hit a barrier before powering on across the grass, gravel and the track before slamming into a tyre wall.

In between, Barrichello lost his lead in the first round of pit stops, actually dropping to third behind Webber and Kubica.

And from that moment it all went wrong, in contrast to Button as the race and the title came to him.

He pulled off another great manoeuvre on Buemi at one stage and the championship was ultimately in the bag when Barrichello pitted late on for a third time due to a slow puncture.

From that moment it was a cruise to the line for Button, who was ecstatic after emerging from his car.

Barrichello was the first to congratulate his team-mate as they gave each other a bear hug and slaps on the back.

Britain has a new world champion with Button a worthy successor to Hamilton, who graciously passed on his congratulations afterwards.

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