F1 | Spanish GP | Valtteri Bottas: "Long run down to Turn 1 at the start will be my best opportunity"
Valtteri Bottas who will be starting along side his pole sitter Mercedes Teammate Lewis Hamilton thinks run down the first turn will be crucial,
Going by the norm, Spanish GP 2020 Qualifying again saw Valtteri Bottas getting beaten by his by just smallest of the margin, it was evident from the first two session of the Qualifying that Valtteri was not able to rattle the timesheet and depose his teammate off top of the timing sheets and same continued for the last session.
It all came down to the last sector where Lewis edged out Valtteri Bottas and pipped him for the pole position. Bottas seemed to be doing fastest sector times in first two sectors of the track but it all came down to the third sector where Lewis was able to extract more out of the tyres and the car to edge his teammate Valtteri.
Valtteri Bottas in revealed in Mercedes Amg F1 post qualifying press release that his best chance to win the Spanish GP will be the long run down to Turn and he will try to come out first.
“The person at the front always has the best chance, so that long run down to Turn 1 at the start will be my best opportunity and I'll try to get there first.”
Appreciating the performance of his Mercedes teammate Valtteri said:
“I knew it was going to be close with Lewis, but he did a really nice and clean lap on that first run in Q3, Lewis did a good job and it's been another really strong performance as a team that we can be proud of.”
Valtteri Bottas thinks his struggle in sector three was responsible for denying him the pole position and the gap of less than a tenth to his teammate and he is annoyed by that tiny gap.
“Particularly in sector three, where I've been struggling a bit all through today. The balance of the car wasn't quite right for me in that sector, but it kept getting better and better through Qualifying. In the end, it just wasn't quite good enough, which is a little annoying.”
After terrific tyre management Max Verstappen and Red Bull demonstrated at F170 GP, in hindsight Bottas fears the repeat of that performance but thinks the long run pace is enough to keep any kind of charge from behind at bay.
“Looking to tomorrow, my long runs have been competitive but The Red Bull looked very strong in the long runs, so I'm sure they'll be quick tomorrow as well.”
