Valtteri Bottas is planning to unleash version “2.77” in 2020 as he sets his sights on a season-long title challenge.
The number is a build on ‘Bottas 2.0’ which referenced a new approach he implemented and led to a dominant victory in Australia to start this past season.
However, even version 2.0 couldn’t keep up with Lewis Hamilton as he finished 87 points behind his Mercedes teammate and the Finn knows he isn’t the only rival he has to watch out for next year.
“The fact is, I think competition is only going to get tougher between the top three teams,” Bottas admitted. “So, for sure beating Lewis is always hard, but it means also beating the other drivers.
“But I know I have the speed in me and the ability so I don’t think I need to make any miracles. I need to fine-tune everything – so, let’s say ‘Bottas 2.77′, maybe,” he concluded with the No.77 of course his race number.
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Reflecting on 2019, however, which saw Bottas take four wins along the way, the 30-year-old was satisfied with his progress.
“It’s been a very good year of improvement all around,” he explained.
“I’ve been learning a lot about myself for sure from last year to this year, and from all the mistakes from last year. It’s been helping me to be a better driver.
“Obviously I’ve had many weekends this year that could have been a lot better, so there are many points we are going to review with the team and find the causes, why the pace was not there or why I did a mistake.
“We will really go deep into details and again I can learn from those.”
As for the highlight of the year…
“It’s still Melbourne,” Bottas added. “The race I had. It is weird when I think about it, it feels like it was someone else. It was surreal. It just felt too easy.
“It’s a funny feeling, so that was definitely my best race ever, best Sunday ever and I wasn’t on the pole, so I had a good start from second place and I got the lead there.”