JENSON BUTTON

#11 SMP Racing BRE-AER BR1 F1 starts 306 Sportscar starts 4

Jenson Button admits that he’s always had a latent desire to compete in the Le Mans 24 Hours, an event he describes as “one of the biggest races in the world”. But it wasn’t on his radar at the end of last year as he worked out where he wanted to race after a sabbatical following his retirement from F1.

The 2009 F1 world champion opted to maintain his links with Honda and race in the Super GT series, though there were discussions about joining the Japanese manufacturer’s Acura brand for its IMSA Sportscar Championship assault with Penske Racing. As for Le Mans, he says, “I really didn’t think there was an opportunity for me”.

That changed with a phone call from James Rossiter. An old friend from BAR days, when he was part of the F1 team’s roster of test drivers, Rossiter had been running with the Bykolles privateer P1 team and had seen SMP Racing’s new BR Engineering BR1 chassis on track.

“He told me that he’d seen the car testing at Aragon and Portimao and said, ‘You’ve got to get yourself in it’,” recalls Button. “He reckoned that it was working really well out on circuit and he thought they had a seat for me.

“I thought, ‘Oh, hello.’ I got my manager to call them and we came to an agreement pretty quickly that I’d do Le Mans and the WEC superseason.”

Button explains that the chance was too good to turn down – he didn’t want to wait to fulfil his ambition to race at Le Mans: “The superseason includes two Le Mans races, so if I didn’t jump in now, I was really looking at 2020 before I could get there. And I’ll be 40 by then.”

Button insists he isn’t looking at his drive in the Aer-engined BR1 as a lead-in to a possible deal with a manufacturer in the future.

“At this stage of my career, I’m only thinking about the now,” he says. “This year is a fantastic opportunity for the privateers and I’m committed to going to Le Mans to challenge for victory and hopefully stand on the podium.”

“I’m committed to going to Le Mans to challenge for victory” JENSON BUTTON