Valtteri Bottas: “It feels good”

Outclassed by Lewis Hamilton for a few races, Valtteri Bottas finally got the better of his teammate this Saturday. On the Portimão circuit, the Mercedes driver took pole position at the Portuguese Grand Prix.

On pole for the 17th time in his career, the Finn was happy to have been able to respond in qualifying, an exercise in which he had been struggling recently.

« It feels good to be on pole, it’s been a while since it happened, savored Valtteri Bottas whose last pole dates back to the Sakhir Grand Prix last December. Qualifying went well although it was my weak point during the last two Grands Prix.

In particular, I had difficulty getting the tires to work. We worked a lot and it’s nice to see that it paid off. I'm in a good position for the race ».

He's not called the flying Finn for nothing! 

 @ValtteriBottas #PortugueseGP  #F1 pic.twitter.com/ZwNdmZD6sx

— Formula 1 (@F1) May 1, 2021

A good position from which he hopes to benefit all the more as he will have the advantage of starting the Grand Prix with medium tires.

« Since the start of the weekend we have not felt good with the soft tyres. We are better with the mediums like last year here where we used them for the last part of qualifying and it worked.

This time, the wind was stronger on my last attempt and I didn't manage to warm up my tires so I'm happy to have been able to get a good result anyway. Starting with medium tires is a good thing. This gives us the opportunity to go far in the race on our first relay ».

Valtteri Bottas now hopes to control his start well in order to put himself in a good position to win his first race this season.