Opinion: Edd Straw

Valtteri Bottas has made an impressive start to the season, but the switch from being Lewis Hamilton’s wingman to his title rival requires another crucial step

Something Lewis Hamilton said after finishing second to Mercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottas in the recent Azerbaijan Grand Prix was very telling. It proved that, while the Finn has made a strong start to the season, the reigning world champion doesn’t see him as a serious title threat. If – and it’s a big if – he ever does, it will become very obvious.

“Selfishly, I could have pushed a lot harder and Valtteri would have lost positions and I would have gained positions,” said Hamilton. It’s true that he could have forced Bottas wide earlier in the first corner and hung him out to dry, which is exactly what he would do to a title rival. That’s why Bottas needs what might be termed his‘rosberg moment’.

Hamilton will still be absolutely certain that he has Bottas covered despite being a point behind in the championship. While he was outqualified by Bottas in Baku, historically it’s not a Hamilton circuit. Even then, despite a bad first sector on his final Q3 run, Hamilton was set to beat Bottas until a moment in Turn 16. It was a similar story in China, where Bottas took his other pole. As for the Australia race reverse, it was the consequence of the start, compounded by Hamilton’s floor damage.

This run of form is not really about Bottas usurping Hamilton as the Mercedes leader. That would be a Herculean task, for Hamilton is one of the all-time greats at the peak of his powers.

But having ended last season seemingly a busted flush, one who cut a desultory figure and couldn’t wait for 2018 to end, this is about Bottas re-establishing himself. It’s a credit to his fortitude that he’s been able to pick himself up, dust himself down and start the year so well. That’s a quality he shares with the aforementioned Nico Rosberg.

While all three of Bottas’s Mercedes seasons have started positively, things are a little different this year. He has come in with a harder edge, determined to do things his way. There’s also been a change in personnel around him, with Rosberg’s former race engineer at Mercedes and Williams, Tony Ross, joining the Mercedes Formula E programme. To replace him, Riccardo Musconi moved over from Hamilton’s car, where he was performance engineer.

Bottas knows he has a tenuous grasp on his Mercedes seat – the presence of Esteban Ocon in the garage is a constant reminder of that. What will be decisive is that he sustains this form and doesn’t repeat the declines of 2017 and 2018.

“I’ve been maybe a bit more direct and more, let’s say, aggressive in the sense of how big changes we’ve been making in practice and what kind of set-up directions we’ve been taking,”said Bottas in Baku of his 2019 approach.“as the years go by, you gain confidence in knowing exactly what you need from the car and how you feel the car will be quicker for you.

I’ve definitely improved in that sense.

“I also have a new core engineering team, with a new race and performance engineer. That also brings many different ideas to the table and a different way of thinking, which then makes me also think different things on the set-up – what will work with me and for the car. So there’s been big development there from my side, and something I’m to keep learning and keep carrying on for the season.”

Bottas does get the best out of slightly different car characteristics to those Hamilton favours, which is why he’s generally performed better early in the season while the car is still being dialled in. Hamilton is at his best when able to latebrake, rotate the rear aggressively on entry and pivot around a strong front end, which isn’t Bottas’s forte. Hence when the front end is weaker, such as on the lower-grip smoother circuits where Bottas excels, he can be as quick and sometimes quicker. That doesn’t mean Bottas sets his car up for less grip, but can tinker with the balance and the dynamics on entry to get the car to respond his way on entry and hustle into the turn.

If Bottas sustains his performance, what he then needs is the Rosberg factor. Neither Rosberg nor Bottas has a reputation for being the most effective wheel-to-wheel racer on the grid. Rosberg had to push himself to find that extra level of aggression, and Bottas is in a similar position. Rosberg used that to rile Hamilton in battle at times, for example when they collided at Spa in 2014. That’s one way Bottas could have his Rosberg moment, announcing himself as a title contender by forcing contact on track.

But that’s the high-risk strategy, albeit one that could follow from a subtler‘rosberg moment’. The moment, if it ever comes, that would herald the breakthrough will be when Hamilton feels obliged not to give Bottas what may be termed generous space in battle. If that happens, Hamilton’s on-track demeanour will make it unmissable.

But until that happens, Bottas will always be cast as wingman. And whether that’s enough to hang onto his seat, only Toto Wolff really knows.

“It’s a credit to his fortitude that he’s picked himself up, dusted himself down and started so well”