Two of the three oldest drivers in Formula 1 racing started one - two and finished the same way in the season-opener of the world's most prestigious and expensive racing series at the Grand Prix of Melbourne (Australia).
Drivers Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello are members of a team which didn't even exist a month ago, Brawn GP.
The two drivers are relatively old for the sport, but age also brings experience and skill, and both drivers and their team ran a smart, determined and aggressive race.
Italian Jarno Trulli took third place for Toyota, the world's largest car maker.
Reigning World Driving Champion Lewis Hamilton of the UK started 18th on the 20-car grid and finished fourth, by passing other cars and attrition, winning points for himself and the McLaren Mercedes team as he began defending his title.
The race saw the safety car, the F1 equivalent of the yellow flag in American racing, deployed twice.
After the race's start, Button never looked back in the 58 lap event, establishing a huge lead in the first lap. The UK's Ross Brawn, one of the top engineers and strategists in F1, who had a strong hand in creating the glory days of F1 teams including Benetton and Ferrari, just a month ago put together a leveraged buy-out of the former Honda F1 team.
Honda, an on-again, off-again force in the sport since the 1960's, and the first Japanese company to enter the world of F1, and made an American driver, Richie Ginther, the team's star (see the movie "Grand Prix" starring Toshiro Mifuni as Mr. Honda and James Garner as Ginther).
Honda left F1 during the recent off-season, saying the huge budget which F1 demands (estimated at over $400 million annually for competitive teams) could not be justified during the worldwide recession.
In fact, apart from Richard Branson's Virgin Air, there were almost no sponsor logos on the Brawn GP cars. We predict that will change before the series' next race.
When Honda withdrew this past autumn, observers expected them to shutter the team entirely, but apparently they were open to sales opportunitiest.
Brawn organized a consortium of investors and bought the Honda team last month. And Jenson Button reportedly took a 50% pay cut to help get the team rolling; he'll still get an estimated $8 million a year for driving in the 17-race season.
A major change for the old Honda team is Brawn's use of Mercedes-Benz engines. The MB engines are known for their speed and, most importantly, durability. You can't win any race if you don't finish.
MB would have swept the podium except for Trulli and his indefatigable spirit. Toyota has struggled during its relatively short history in F1, so a podium finish means a lot to the company. By Monday, there will be Jarno Trulli posters in Toyota dealerships and offices around the world.
Added to the dramatic twists and turns of the race itself were the most drastic rule changes in F1 in over 25 years.
In money-saving moves, on-track testing of the cars and using wind tunnels to fine-tune aerodynamics have been drastically cut back by FIA, the sport's Paris-based sanctioning body.
The 2009 cars appear entirely different from last year's, with a front end looking like a shark or, some say, a vampire, a wider and lower front wing, completely re-done side pods and smaller rear wings. For the first time in 11 years, F1 has returned to using slick tires, supplied by Bridgestone. Teams still have a choice of running hard or soft tire compounds, depending on track conditions and race strategy.
F1 teams have the option this year of using Kinetic Energy Recovery Systems (KERS). The system uses mechanical, chemical and electrical energy to store power previously lost under braking. The cars' crankshafts keep spinning when the driver hits the brakes. A generator placed on the driveshaft captures that formerly-wasted energy. Using a series of batteries and a flywheel made of carbon fiber, KERS stores the energy. When the driver presses a button on the steering wheel, an extra 80-horsepower is added to the rear wheels for a short time.
The KERS device can add an instant, extra 80-horsepower to the already stout F1 engines
Currently, there are no F1 events scheduled for North America. The race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway was called off after only a few years at the track. A fiasco involving high speeds and tires saw only six cars start the event. F1's annual visit to Montreal has also been cancelled.
The Formula 1 "circus" now moves to Kuala Lumbur, Malaysia for racing the weekend of April 3rd through the 5th.