Bottas hopeful of 2019 title challenge

Valtteri Bottas believes that he is capable of a championship challenge despite his recent form. The Finn has struggled in the second half of the season compared to teammate Lewis Hamilton after enduring an unlucky opening to his 2018 campaign.

In the United States Grand Prix, Bottas slumped to a fifth-place finish, losing out to a recovering Sebastian Vettel to cement a disappointing weekend for him. The Mercedes man however was quick to regroup and believes that next season will be much different than the current campaign.

“My goal is for sure to try and be stronger. One day things will come together," Bottas said after the race.

“I think performance-wise every race this season I’ve been able to perform better than last year and that’s what I try to continue to keep doing with this team all the time, learning.

"I am very keen to be better next year and hopefully that will bring those results."

Bottas was incredibly unlucky to not claim a race victory in the first few races of the season. In China, a late safety car wiped his advantage he built up and let Daniel Ricciardo capitalise on fresh rubber.

Later in Azerbaijan, a heartbreaking puncture with just two laps of the race left forced him to retire from the lead of the race, gifting the win to his teammate.

“I don’t like to calculate those things because in the end after each race that is the situation you’re in and you’re always trying to then make the best out of the future," he admitted to media after the race in Austin.

“But when you have many setbacks in a row then at some point it kind of becomes a bit of a joke and that’s for me how I felt at some point this year.”