Button gives Mercedes a thrashing after 'Red Bull is already champion' statement

Jenson Button does not think that this season's world championship in Formula 1 is already a done deal. The one-time world champion pointed to the fact that only one race has been run and that the Bahrain International Circuit is unique in its kind: it is not said that Red Bull's dominance last week means that Max Verstappen has already secured his third world title in a row.

Mercedes has already thrown in the towel. Toto Wolff announced this week that he assumes Red Bull will win every Grands Prix. George Russell previously did so last Sunday. The 25-year-old driver said the Milton Keynes-based team already has the world title in hand.

At Aston Martin, there is particular caution not to create excessive expectations. Fernando Alonso continued to say even after his podium finish in Bahrain that it is really not certain that his new employer will invariably continue to compete for podium places, let alone victories, in the remainder of this season. Team boss Mike Krack also said not to look too closely at what Red Bull is doing. Ferrari in particular was left disillusioned in the Middle East after again experiencing reliability problems.

Button heard Mercedes in particular were already giving up the fight, but the analyst thinks it is far too early to call anything on the outcome of the championship. "How can you say that already? We have only had one race and that too at a unique circuit like Bahrain," the 43-year-old Briton said at Formula 1.nl. "I don't believe in that."

Even at Red Bull itself, they are not blowing up too high after one impressive one. Max Verstappen, Christian Horner and Helmut Marko all said afterwards that the season is still long and that development must continue in order to maintain the lead. Handicap here is that teams like Aston Martin have quite a lot more wind tunnel time.