WATERED DOWN; Button and Brawn GP win rain-shortened Malaysia race.

Byline: ADAM COOPER

After just one victory in his first nine seasons, Jenson Button won on a rainy afternoon in Malaysia when all of the top runners hit trouble, kicking off 2009 with two dominant wins.

Button crossed the finish line with the race under caution in Australiathe first victory for a new team since Jody Scheckter won in 1977 in Argentina for Walter Wolfbut at the Sepang Circuit, he won while sitting on the grid waiting for a restart.

A monstrous storm suspended the race on lap 31 of 56, and though the weather cleared, impending gloom made it impossible to finish. Commercial boss Bernie Ecclestone's much-criticized decision to move the local start time from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. for the benefit of Euro-pean TV audiences left no safety net. The premature conclusion meant that the top eight finishers scored only half points for only the fifth time in the sport's history.

Button did not have an easy day. He won the pole by less than 0.1 second over Toyota's Jarno Trulli, and both Trulli and Williams-Toyota's Nico Rosberg passed him at the start. The significance of the ongoing twin-diffuser controversy (Com-petition, April 6) was made clear as the Williams, the Toyota and the Brawnthree cars using the devicesleft everyone else trailing. The diffuser issue was set to be decided by the FIA Court of Appeal on April 14, the day after AutoWeek went to press.

Button had a few extra laps' worth of fuel in the first stint, and he waited until his two rivals pitted, then took advantage of a clear track to record a best lap a full second quicker than those of his main challengers.

The skies then darkened, and rain appeared imminent. When the first drops fell, ...