Jenson pushes right buttons with flying lap

Jenson Button took centre stage for all the right reasons by setting the fastest lap in today’s final practice for the Hungarian Grand Prix.

Button, whose future is the subject of a public row between BAR and Williams, set the quickest time of the weekend so far to boost his confidence ahead of this afternoon’s qualifying sessions.

His best lap of one minute 19.556 seconds was just 0.191secs faster than Ferrari’s Michael Schumacher but swiped over two seconds off Fernando Alonso’s 2003 pole position time.

Rubens Barrichello had held top spot going into the final minute of the session but he was knocked down to third, with Williams stand-in Antonio Pizzonia fourth.

David Coulthard was within a second and a half of Button’s time but a close session meant he languished down in 12th for McLaren.

The first session started slowly but the second was more lively with first Kimi Raikkonen and then Schumacher going fastest in the opening minutes.

Felipe Massa’s preparations for qualifying were hit by a mechanical problem which saw the Brazilian park up at the edge of the track with smoke pouring from his Sauber’s Ferrari engine.

Schumacher pulled further clear as the session neared its halfway mark, with Ferrari team-mate Barrichello jumping into second.

Takuma Sato and Alonso both moved ahead of Barrichello by posting exactly the same time, with the Japanese BAR driver taking second by virtue of setting the time before his Renault rival.

They were both bumped back though when Pizzonia became the first man to lap in under 1min 20secs but his time at the top did not last long with fellow Brazilian Barrichello bettering his effort.

With 10 minutes remaining, Button moved into fourth with his best effort of the weekend so far but he bettered that in the final seconds to go fastest.

Schumacher was the class of the field in today’s opening practice session.

His lap of one minute 20.216 seconds put the German 0.266secs clear of nearest challenger Pizzonia, whose Williams team-mate Juan Pablo Montoya was third.