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The ex-Formula One star has reportedly ended his marriage to the top Japanese model
The pair had been dating for five years before marrying at the end of 2014
Racing driver Jenson Button and stunning wife Jessica have split just a year after they married, it was claimed on Tuesday.
The ex-Formula One world champion and underwear model Jessica Michibata tied the knot last year in an intimate ceremony in Hawaii.
But
the pressures of their jobs, keeping them in different parts of the
world, has taken its toll and the pair have reportedly gone their
separate ways.
Only last week Jenson, 35, was bemoaning an
extension of the gruelling F1 calendar, saying: “It’s difficult for any
mechanic or engineer to have a relationship right now, so 21 races is
going to be tough. I hope it doesn’t grow in 2017.”
He had
previously revealed the trouble he and Jessica had spending any time
together when he admitted: “We don’t see each other now any more than
before we were married.”
The pair side ‘I do’ in an intimate ceremony in Hawaii in December 2014
Read more: Relive their love story from the beginning
The former playboy and the top Japanese-Argentine model, 31, had been dating for five years before marrying.
Now friends are claiming the golden couple have officially split up.
Jessica
spends most of her time in Tokyo where she shares a modest flat with
her mother, while hundreds of miles away in Monaco, Jenson spends a lot
of time alone in his ‘bachelor’ pad.
He said in an interview
earlier this year: “Jessie still works a lot in Japan. She enjoys her
job, she models, she had a television show and has done a Japanese film.
“She enjoys working, which is great, but it obviously means that we don’t see each other very often.”
The couple celebrate Jenson’s win at the Belgian Grand Prix 2012
And he admitted that his hectic schedule meant he wasn’t able to give Jessica dates when they could meet up.
He
added: “I’m travelling so much with racing that I can’t say: ‘I’m going
to have a weekend off Formula 1 and come to Japan to see you,’ It just
doesn’t happen like that with sport.”
“She’ll come to half the races but when I’m at a race, I’m not the same person as when I am not at a race,” he admitted.
And
revealingly he added: “I have to be selfish. I have to be focused. I am
a very different person, and Jessie knows that, and she understands
that, as do most of my friends and family. I can be a bit snappy over a
race weekend.
The couple cuddle up on a yacht in 2009
Read more: Jenson Button and Jessica devastated as her £250,000 engagement ring is stolen
“I
just need my apartment to be simple, easy, so I can come in, do my
thing, and leave again, pack and repack and leave. It’s been my life for
16 years now – you get used to travelling the circus.”
The McLaren driver, from Frome, Somerset, and Jessica were in Hawaii last Christmas when they married at a ceremony in Maui.
The
last pictures the couple shared of each other on their Instagram
accounts were over seven weeks ago, with Jessica quitting Twitter
completely in October.
A spokesman for Jenson said:
“Jenson and Jessica have decided to go their separate ways and it is
very amicable. There is no-one else involved.”
