Sakhir, Bahrain - Jenson Button extended his lead at the top of the Formula One drivers' standings Sunday when the Brawn GP driver claimed victory in the Bahrain Grand Prix in Sakhir. The Briton secured his third win out of four this season in a time of 1 hour 31 minutes 48.182 seconds ahead of Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull with Toyota's Jarno Trulli, who started from pole position, having to settle for third.

Defending world champion Lewis Hamilton in a McLaren-Mercedes came home fourth, followed by Rubens Barrichello in the second Brawn GP car.

Kimi Raikkonen earned Ferrari's first points of the season with a sixth-place finish, with Toyota's Timo Glock and two-time world champion Fernando Alonso of Renault completing the points placings.

It was a bitterly disappointing race for BMW-Sauber with Robert Kubica and Nick Heidfeld trailing home in 18th and 19th place.

However, Heidfeld had the slight consolation of setting a new record of finishing 25 GP races in a row, surpassing the previous record of 24 set by fellow German Michael Schumacher.

In an uneventful race compared to the fireworks of the first three, Glock made it to the first corner ahead of team-mate Trulli, who also briefly lost second place to Hamilton before fighting back.

Hamilton failed to hold his third-place position either and was overtaken by Button at the start of the second lap, a manouevre that turned out to be crucial in the destination of the race win.

It was a disastrous start for BMW's Kubica and Kazuki Nakajima of Williams as both drivers had to pit for a new nose-cone while Ferrari's Felipe Massa was forced to return to the pits with what appeared to be a KERS problem.

With Vettel being held up by Hamilton in fourth place, Glock, Trulli and Button slowly pulled away from the rest of the field.

As expected, Glock pitted at the end of lap 10 with Trulli coming in a lap later, handing the race lead to Button ahead of Hamilton, Vettel and Barrichello.

Trulli returned in sixth but was passed by Alonso with 44 laps remaining. Button and Hamilton pitted two laps later to hand the lead to Vettel with Raikkonen moving up to second.

Vettel pitted for the first time with 39 laps to go, returning behind the Toyota of Trulli while Button regained the race lead after Raikkonen's first stop.

Barrichello was the first of the leading group to pit for a second time, while team-mate Button continued to extend his lead over Trulli, Vettel and Hamilton by up to a second a lap.

Glock pitted with 24 laps to go but returned behind Renault's Nelson Piquet Jr, while Button came in three laps later holding a lead of 17 seconds over Trulli, who also pitted.

The Briton returned behind Vettel, who pushed to build up a lead before pitting for a final time on lap 40 and returning ahead of Trulli but handing back the lead to the Brawn driver. (dpa)

While Button retained a healthy lead in the region of 10 seconds over Vettel for the remainder of the race, the German had to contend with stern competition from Trulli in the battle for second before eventually prevailing.

The 2009 F1 season now moves to Europe for the Spanish GP in Barcelona on May 10.