Reports are emerging that a multi-squillion dollar deal has been struck between BAR and WilliamsF1 that will allow Button to wriggle out of his contract with Williams.
This is by no means official yet but it seems that Button has finally got his way. Sir Frank Williams is notorious for playing hard-ball with matters of contracts and he had seemed adamant that he was determined to keep hold of Button's contract. Though the rumour has been recently that this was just a public show to try to squeeze as much compensation from Button/BAR as possible, and I've no doubt it has worked a treat. I doubt we'll ever know the exact figure paid by BAR but it will probably have been enough to compensate for any loss in sponsorship that will result from the loss of Button. A figure that has been thrown around in the press is £25million. I'm sure Williams know as well as anyone that at the moment the priority for the team is not getting in a very highly paid driver, the priority MUST be on improving the woefully underperforming cars of this season.
Now of course the F1 driver market can get into full swing. The big question now hangs over who will be driving the Cosworth powered Williams cars for next year. Mark Webber has a contract for next year but there are rumours that Flavio Briatore is willing to do a swap deal with Renault's Giancarlo Fisichella. Nick Heidfeld has been confirmed for BMW next season so there is a spare seat going. The hot favourites are Pizzonia (due to race at Interlagos next week, and will be looking to impress at his home GP) and Williams youngster Nico Rosberg, currently starring in the GP2 series.
This means that Takuma Sato is almost certainly out of a race seat for 2006. He will most likely take Anthony Davidson's test seat at BAR, with Davidson switching to Midland/Jordan.
Provisional F1 driver line-ups for '06:
Ferrari - M. Schumacher, F. Massa
McLaren - K. Raikkonen, J.P. Montoya
Renault - F. Alonso, G. Fisichella/M. Webber
Toyota - J Trulli, R. Schumacher
BAR-Honda - J. Button, R. Barrichello
Williams-Cosworth - G. Fisichella/M. Webber?, A. Pizzonia/N. Rosberg
Red Bull - D. Coulthard, C. Klien
BMW-Sauber - N. Heidfeld, J Villeneuve? ( )
Midland - A. Davidson, Karthikeyan/Monteiro/other???
Red Bull2/Minardi - V. Liuzzi, S. Speed