BAR race lasts three laps.

BAR-Honda's decision to 'forcibly retire' its two cars at the end of the Australian Grand Prix backfired - ironically and spectacularly - at Sepang, where both Jenson Button and Anthony Davidson were on the sidelines by lap three.

The team took the controversial decision to retire Button and Takuma Sato on the last lap in Melbourne in order to exploit a loophole in the rules that would allow both drivers to start the Malaysian GP weekend with a fresh V10. With the protests still ringing in their ears, the team then had to deal with an oil leak that caused Button's car to smoke ahead of first qualifying, but opted to stick with the motor instead of taking a ten-place grid penalty.

The Briton, and temporary team-mate Davidson, qualified ninth and 15th for the race but, despite feisty openings, were both hit by engine failures before the third lap was complete. The team confirmed that the cause of both failures appeared to be a recurrence of the leak which caused Button to miss the second of Saturday's free practice sessions, after a countermeasure put in place proved to be insufficiently robust.

While Button's engine was always likely to be suspect, Davidson's also succumbed to the problem, causing both BAR's to be parked by the Sepang roadside with flames licking around the bodywork.

"This was a bitterly disappointing end to our race weekend, particularly since Jenson got such a good start and was easily making places in the early laps," technical director Geoff Willis admitted, "The car was handling well and we were confident that our race pace and strategy would bring very good results."

Honda engineering director Shuhei Nakamoto apologised to the team, promising that another fix would be developed in time for the Bahrain round in two weeks' time.