28/02/2022
NEWS STORY
In what might be a contender for the F1 understatement of the year, Valtteri Bottas says that his new team has work to do.
Over the course of the three day Barcelona test, Alfa Romeo completed just 176 laps (511 miles/822 kms), compared to Ferrari's 439 laps.
The bulk of the Italian team's tally came courtesy of Guanyu Zhou who completed 112 laps, while teammate Valtteri Bottas managed just 55.
Over the course of the test the team suffered numerous issues, and was among the first to experience the porpoising phenomenon, however Bottas, who has spent the previous five seasons in the best car on the grid, is seemingly not downhearted.
"I've got some kind of feeling, and the nice feeling is that I definitely feel there is potential," says the Finn. "There's some strong areas in the car in certain types of corners, but also of course we immediately noticed points to work on with the balance, with some of the behaviour.
"It feels like we're still in the very early stages of actually discovering the car," he adds. "For me, it was quite limited running that we had only with two different tyre compounds, only with quite a very few setup changes, so there's still so much more to discover. That's why we're really aiming to work hard between the tests and hopefully get to get a bit better understanding in Bahrain.
"But there's work to do," he admits. "I'm not saying anything against that, but also I feel like there is potential in this package, and I'm looking forward to discover more about it with the team."
On a personal level, it appears that somebody has forgotten to tell the Finn that he is no longer at Mercedes.
"I absolutely feel that I have still so much to do to get better, and so much more to give to the sport," he says. "As a driver I think you never, ever stop learning as long as you want to.
"It truly feels like now I can just be the best version of myself instead of trying to be something else and trying too hard," he continues. "I'm always looking at areas that I can be better.
"For sure I need a bit of a reset on all my targets," he admits. "Most likely I'm not going to be fighting for the race wins immediately, that's pretty realistic to say. But eventually it will be.
"As a driver, of course I drive to win races. "But we also need to be realistic about where we come from as a team.
"It's been a challenging last couple of years for Alfa Romeo, but I'm here to help and I'm here to work hard to do my part that we're going to make progress. But in the end it's going to be a team effort. I don't see me as the only leader of the team: we're in this together, that's the feeling.
"I think in the first year with the team, if we can get more consistently in the points than previous years that would already be an achievement," he says. "But of course, secretly I'm also aiming very high. I want to be up there, so I'll keep pushing and also try and keep guiding the team and really push forward together united.
"I think that's going to give us eventually the results, and that's going to be so rewarding."