Jenson Button received the well-known McLaren Autosport BRDC award in 1998 due to his achievements that season. This meant, among other things, that Button got a chance to test drive the McLaren MP4/13, with which Hakkinen won his first Formula 1 title in 1998.
The test took place in November 1999 at Silverstone, and former McLaren team principal Ron Dennis was impressed with Button at its conclusion. A few weeks later, the pilot took a plane to Barcelona for another test, this time with a Prost team car in Formula 3000.
The Frenchman said he felt Button was “something special”, and offered him a seat in Formula 3000, as well as a reserve driver role with the F1 team, but Button turned down this very deal because they couldn’t really promise him a full-time top flight seat.
Williams had also set his sights on Button
Due to disappointing sporting results, Alessandro Zanardi’s contract with Williams was not extended at the end of 1999. At the time, the Grove team was keen to sign Juan Pablo Montoya, but due to contractual issues he was unable to make it to F1 until after the year 2000. This meant that Ralf Schumacher had no teammate and Williams had to find someone to fill the gap.
Button’s successful tests behind the wheel of an F1 did not go unnoticed by Frank Williams , who personally telephoned the British driver. At first, the British pilot thought it was a joke, but soon after he was on a plane headed for Jerez.
On the Spanish track, Williams organized a duel between Button and Bruno Junqueira, who was driving an F3000 at the time and was a test driver for the team.
The first confrontation between the two was plagued by engine problems. As a result, they were forced to continue testing a week later, to give the duo a fairer chance. This time it went off without a hitch and the two drivers were able to complete more than twenty laps each.
The difference between Button and Junqueira was 0.016 seconds in favor of the Briton. The more experienced Brazilian was overtaken by a 20-year-old British driver. This made the choice even more difficult for Williams.
While it is true that many engineers preferred Junqueira , the fact that Button was slightly faster was the key deciding factor in the choice. Finally, on January 24, 2000, Williams called a press conference and confirmed its new driver. “It’s been tense, it took us a while to make the decision,” Frank Williams said before mentioning Jenson Button’s name.
