Bottas regrets decision to stay with new aero package
Valtteri Bottas says he regrets sticking with the aerodynamic upgrade that Mercedes brought for the Malaysian Grand Prix, after qualifying almost seven tenths slower than teammate Lewis Hamilton at Sepang.
Hamilton decided to ditch the new package – which includes a wider 'nose cape' just behind the front wing – ahead of today's sessions, while Bottas opted to plough on and try to make it work having beaten Hamilton while using it in FP3.
While Hamilton took pole position with a lap of 1m30.076s, Bottas could only manage a Q3 best of 1m30.758s.
"It's easy to say afterwards, but if I could do the qualifying again for sure I'd go for the other package," Bottas told NBCSN.
"For sure, we need to review everything. We need to see what are the actual differences. Obviously the gap in Q3 was huge. It's difficult to say [for the race], we will see tomorrow.
"We will look into everything to fully understand what's going on with the car because it's so much work sometimes to get it working right, and sometimes we get it working and sometimes not. I didn't get it today."
When asked if he thought Mercedes might need to use him to cover Sebastian Vettel's expected charge for Ferrari from the rear of the grid on Sunday, Bottas claimed he was more focused on what will be going on ahead of him.
"Hopefully we have enough pace that we can focus ahead, and try to beat both of the Ferraris rather than just one," he said. "We'll see how it goes."
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