Mercedes admits Bottas now to support Hamilton for this season's title
Jul.22 - Valtteri Bottas will fall in line behind Lewis Hamilton's championship charge for the remainder of the 2021 head-to-head with Max Verstappen.
At Silverstone, a slipstream from the Finn helped Hamilton onto the Friday pole position, and Bottas then obeyed Mercedes' team orders to let the seven time world champion pass en route to victory on Sunday.
Team boss Toto Wolff admits Bottas has fallen in line behind Hamilton.
"The chances of Valtteri winning the championship are already very small compared to Lewis, who is in this very close fight," the Austrian said.
"We discussed the issue, and no matter how hard it was for the driver to hear, this season we cannot afford to have our drivers take points from one another."
When asked if Bottas' subservient role will help him retain the Mercedes seat for 2022, Wolff answered: "This is just one of the factors, but I am glad for this assistance.
"I simply love to see this teamwork," he added.
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To be honest he'll offer little help, just not fast enough to be a problem to the faster RB cars.
Well, the RB cars are fast, but the RB car of Perez was not a problem for Mercedes in last race. Bottas scored 16 points for his team while Checco scored 0. Mercedes as a team scored a whopping 45 points against Red Bull who only put 3 points in the bag and might have to take on a penalty later this season, because Verstappen's engine probably didn't improved performance because of the 51G shunt. Not bad for a 10s penalty. I wonder which strategy Red Bull will choose next race...
Perez wasn't a problem because he started in the pits, nothing to do with the speed of RB. Bottas couldn't get near the best Ferrari.
wont bottas be good for blocker/rear-guard action .slowing the fied down etc.
As VB/77 fan, I'm disconsolate. If Merc wins the team title (which I'm doubtful) hope Merc will give VB/77 a generous going away bonus.
Unfortunately, Bottas has always been hamiltons number 2 and forced to tow the company line
Nothing new there then.
No doubt after he's been subservient then they will axe him. Won't tell him yet in case he doesn't obey and harms Lulu's chances.
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