VALTTERI BOTTAS ALFA ROMEO DRIVER

Did you have fun going from seventh to fifth in the GP?

“It was good fun. To be honest, when we went to the slicks, I really could push like a qualifying lap every lap, so that made it pretty fun. Especially the middle to the end of that stint, we had really good performance, good pace. Only the last few laps once I got close to George, my rear right started to grain a bit once I was demanding a bit more traction and so on. I couldn’t quite get him but maybe next time.

Did you have any thoughts about crashing with Russell in 2021 as you caught him?

I tried not to think about it. But Mercedes and

George – that was my motivation throughout the race, to push every lap and hopefully get the chance towards the end. But didn’t quite get it.

I lost like 10 seconds in the pitstop [with a slow rightfront change] so without that, could’ve been a bit different.

Did you have front-wing damage from clipping Ricciardo after he’d hit Sainz? Initially, I was worried, because it was a decent hit – I could feel it. But luckily maybe I hit in the right angle. Suddenly there was

Sainz coming from the right sideways and Ricciardo hit him and I had no time to react and just hit them. But actually I was surprised I could still carry on pretty well and didn’t lose any positions in the start.

How are you feeling about Mercedes’ struggles after been dropped from that team?

I’m very happy to be in the place where I am at the moment. I’m really enjoying it and obviously we had better race pace in the end. I don’t know the reasons why they are struggling, I don’t know their technical details, but I focus on our things and improving our car, which we did this weekend. Hopefully we can do it in the next races as well.