When Valtteri Bottas announced he would be entering Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN, expectations were modest. As Mercedes AMG Petronas F1 Team replaced him with George Russell, there were few quality Formula 1 races available.
But Alfa Romeo has temporarily become the most productive option for Bottas, who won 10 Formula 1 races in 10 years. The two-time championship finalist takes on a whole new role this year, and that’s the one he’s embracing.
“I adapted really well,” Bottas said on a Zoom call on Wednesday. team. There is a little more duty and a little more influence on sure things.
“It was actually herbal because it happened that I was the old man on a team and had a young teammate (Zhou Guanyu). He is an amateur and has a lot to learn. He asked a lot of questions. Even though I still have a few years ahead of me in F1, I’m starting to get a little older. “
The transfer of Mercedes to radical Alfa Romeo. Last year, Bottas won a race and finished third in the championship standings. This year, he did not win podiums or lead laps. Its most productive result is the fifth, achieved in Italy in April.
But it’s a year of growth, Bottas explained. He knew it would be a difficult year and mentally readjusted his expectations.
“It was better than I imagined at the beginning, because the initial concept of not fighting for the race every weekend is not the same,” Bottas said of the change of team. “But I had time to adapt and prepare myself mentally. ” for this new bankruptcy of my career. I take it as a project.
“Of course, I had to review my goals and expectations. But I agree with that because it’s the motivation and rewarding feeling that comes with progress and seeing more speed. If we can achieve our goals in the future, we will feel like we are winning.
Bottas is enjoying the new experience. He firmly believes that now that Alfa Romeo has known some of its weak points, it will grow significantly next year with a new car.
In addition, he said the team itself will grow through expansion plans that will make them “as big a team as any other organization in the future. “
“We had difficult winter tests, so we didn’t run as many kilometers as we could,” he said. Equipment and part of it comes from the side of the unit of force. When you have those messes over the weekend, you come from behind.
This weekend, Formula 1 returns to the Circuit of the Americas, where Bottas takes the fastest lap.
At COTA, Bottas will wear a helmet with the Hyland logo. Hyland is racing with Alfa Romeo this year in a partnership that the Formula 1 team compares the speed of F1 cars to the Ohio-based organization’s performance.