Valtteri Bottas: Of course I miss winning

The main event of the weekend, of course, remains the anniversary marathon of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, but this does not mean that representatives of the world’s motorsport elite who are not involved in the legendary race do not participate in other competitions today.

However, this is a competition of a different nature.

On Saturday, Valtteri Bottas started the FNLD GRVL international cycling race, which took place on unpaved roads in Finland near the town of Lahti. In addition, Alfa Romeo’s pilot was also related to its organization.

The fastest distance of 77 kilometers was covered by Finnish cyclist Jani Heikkinen, who covered it in two and a half hours, but Bottas finished third, losing about five minutes to the winner.

By the way, his friend Tiffany Cromwell, an Australian cyclist, confidently won the race in the women’s category and with a huge advantage. The distance of the professional participants was also much longer – 177 km.

“The FNLD GRVL debut was a success and I finished 3rd over 77km. It seems that everyone liked the game, so I am very pleased. And Tiffany won the women’s race over a distance of 177 km – a very strong performance! But now it’s time for the sauna! Valtteri shared on his pages in social networks.

But cycling is of course mainly a way for Bottas to keep fit, and in general he likes to pedal. But the main thing in life for him is the desire to achieve new successes in Formula 1, because so far his business is not going well this year.

“Of course I hoped to achieve more on this point, but the situation is what it is,” said the Finn in an interview with RacingNews365. – Everything is quite simple: the rest of the teams were able to add more than us last winter. We can’t finish in the places we expected because we expected to be able to earn points regularly. So far I have only managed this in one race and this needs to be changed.

Of course we are making some improvements, but other teams have been able to make really big steps forward. The best example is Aston Martin, and they certainly succeeded where we failed. But their example suggests that it is still possible to take such steps. And this does not mean that this team has crazy resources compared to us, but it indicates the right motivation.

But I enjoy the job, and it’s not just piloting. I participate in the technical part, which is also very interesting. Of course I miss winning, but now I get satisfaction from other things. Our project is designed for the long term and I want to participate in it, but at the same time I do not give up and keep dreaming of victories.

The team has a bright future, concrete plans have already been made and it is clear that all our people are very keen to participate in this. The collaboration with Alfa Romeo is still ongoing, while work with Audi and Sauber has not really started yet, but it will start in a year or two.”