Mercedes had no warning ahead of Valtteri Bottas' puncture in Qatar, and retired the car as they didn't feel he could work his way back into the points. That's according to Mercedes director of trackside engineering Andrew Shovlin. Bottas' weekend at the Losail circuit started brightly under the lights, the Finnish driver fastest in Friday's running. He qualified P3 behind Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen but, along with Verstappen, dropped down the order after being hit with a grid penalty for ignoring yellow flags. That was just the beginning of Sunday's troubles. A tardy get-away had Bottas falling down to 11th place and while it briefly appeared as if he could bounce back, and even...
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