Jenson Button to decide on Formula 1 future this week

Jenson Button will this week make a decision about his future in Formula 1 after it emerged over the weekend that he had already been to visit the Surrey headquarters of McLaren, the team thought most likely to sign him up.

The 29-year-old world champion was given a tour of the futuristic facility near Woking by Martin Whitmarsh, the team principal on Friday, just days after Kimi Raikkonen was also given the tour - the Finn is believed to be number two on the team's hitlist.

If Button does decide to move from constructors' champions Brawn GP, it will be against the advice of many of his predecessors as the best driver in the motorsport. Jackie Stewart told Andrew Marr yesterday that he believed Button should stay put at Brawn.

"If I was Jenson, I would stay with Brawn," he said. "He knows the team, he is comfortable there and Ross Brawn's reputation is outstanding. Going to McLaren will mean putting his head into the tiger's den with Lewis Hamilton already established there. That would be a huge challenge."

Stewart's caution was echoed by Stirling Moss, another British racing great, who told the Guardian that "I think it would be a big risk for Jenson to go into the McLaren team head to head with Lewis. He might find himself beaten by Lewis who I think is possibly the fastest driver out there."

Austrian champion Niki Lauda asked Button to consider whether money was the be-all and end-all in making his decision: "I think Jenson needs to be very certain that he wants to go into a team which Hamilton has very much made his own. If the money involved is about the same, or even slightly less, then Jenson should stay with Brawn."

The Button camp is keen to get across that their man is not greedy, but that he merely wants a return to the wage that he gave up when Brawn decoupled from Honda at the beginning of last season. The driver took a £5m pay cut to £3m a year to ensure the nascent team could remain competitive, and Button had always believed that he would return to his previous salary when the team's financial footing was more secure.

With the drivers' and constructors' championships under their belt, Brawn will have no problem signing up sponsors for this season - the Times reports today that they could bring in £100m for the next season, yet the team have made no offer to Button that takes this into account. McLaren have been quick to exploit this situation, at the prompting of their main sponsor Vodafone who see a team hooking up two British world champions as marketing gold dust. ·