09/04/2017
NEWS STORY
Valtteri Bottas admits his spin during today's Chinese Grand Prix was a "stupid mistake"
The Finn spun whilst running in fifth behind the Safety Car, as he attempted to generate heat into his tyres, subsequently dropping to twelfth.
From then on, while his teammate cruised to victory, it was case of making the best of a bad situation for the Mercedes driver who ended the days sixth narrowly behind countryman Kimi Raikkonen.
"I was trying to generate as much tyre temperature as I could," he told reporters, "but made a mistake and spun and lost many places. Through a stupid mistake of mine, we lost too many points."
"Valtteri threw it away behind the safety car," confirmed team boss Toto Wolff.
"It is race two, there are eighteen to go," he added. "He needs to put it behind him and forget about it. He has the character to recover from such a situation."
The Finn's mood wasn't helped by the fact that at one stage during the race his engineer, Tony Ross, referred to him as Nico.
Check out our Sunday gallery from Shanghai, here.