Brawn GP chief executive officer Nick Fry has blasted Jenson Button on his move away from the Brackley based team to McLaren for the 2010 season. Button has signed a £6mill deal to join the team next year.
According to the Daily Express, the relationship between Button and Brawn ‘broke down so badly that they removed an offer that could have been worth £12 million next year before he signed for McLaren’, after the 29-year-old ‘was left in no doubt that he had let [the team] down in a ‘phone call with Brawn at the weekend’.
Another factor in Button’s choice to move could have been the Mercedes buyout of Brawn GP, and the rumours that they have plans to create an all German ‘super team’.
Fry’s stinging quote is:
“Clearly, loyalty would be nice but in this day and age you don’t expect too much of that. I’m always happy when any employee leaves our company if I think that they’ve made the right decision and they are going to a better job. They always go with our blessing if that is the situation.
“In this situation, we don’t understand the logic of the decision. I think Jenson is going to have to up his game if he’s going to beat Lewis.
“We feel that we gave Jenson a car that enabled him to win the world championship, and we hoped he’d have stuck with us for that reason as we are very confident we can provide a race-winning car for next season.”
Button had previously given his reasoning on the switch. Part of his quote is:
“It’s always a difficult decision to leave a team when you’ve been there for so long. But life is all about challenges – and, most important of all, it’s about challenging yourself. So, although I won the World Championship with Brawn GP last year, and I’ll never forget that, I was always adamant that I wanted to continue to set myself fresh challenges.”
Jack Sargeant is the editor-in-chief and designer of An F1 Blog. Follow him on 
