Valtteri Bottas found it “hard to accept” Lewis Hamilton as the better F1 driver

It's never easy to accept that a 'rival' is just better, and it took Valtteri Bottas five years to digest that Lewis Hamilton is just the better driver.

Valtteri Bottas found it “hard to accept” Lewis Hamilton as the better F1 driver

Valtteri Bottas (L) and Lewis Hamilton (R)

Valtteri Bottas spent the most successful period of his career a Mercedes, where he teamed up with Lewis Hamilton. Despite the 10 race wins, and more than 50 podium finishes, he did not have it easy. He was always under tremendous pressure, particularly with the fact that he was always on one-year contracts. This did not help his mental health, and now that he’s on a multi-year deal with Alfa Romeo, he is definitely much happier, even if not as successful.

There was another issue, of course: Hamilton. The Briton is one of the greatest drivers in the history of the sport and a seven-time world champion. Bottas spent the entirety of his Mercedes career in Hamilton’s shadow. He also often had to give way or compromise his own race to help him. Now that he’s the clear team leader at Alfa Romeo (at least for now), this is no longer an issue. There was another related to Hamilton that was tough on Bottas – accepting that he’s the better driver.

YouTube video

In sports, everyone wants to be the best. When you reach Formula 1, you get there to win championships and be the best. So, it’s a shattering realization to come to accept that one particular driver just may be better than you. It took a long time for Bottas to digest this. In an interview with Finnish journalist Maria Veitola, he conceded: “For such a competitive nature, it was hard to accept.”

It was only in his final year that he came to terms with it. The Finn said: “It was only in the last year [2021] that I could accept that Lewis Hamilton was a better driver. I always wondered how I could beat him and win the world championship. It was quite an exhausting five years. I wanted to win everything right away, and then when it didn’t happen, it was hard to accept.”

Read More: Valtteri Bottas reveals how ‘painful’ training for F1 led to ‘eating disorder’

Valtteri Bottas: Always need to ‘keep improving’ and do better as a team

Valtteri Bottas
Valtteri Bottas

Now his time at Mercedes has ended, and Valtteri Bottas’ full focus will be on achieving his goals with Alfa Romeo. They finished P6 in the championship last season, mostly due to Valtteri Bottas’ early-season heroics. This was their best result since 2012, but they’ll also need to improve further. Audi, which will ‘takeover’ the team in 2026, aim to win races by 2028. Sauber, currently known as Alfa Romeo, will need to take considerable steps forward in the coming years.

Bottas is aware of this, and also that they need to do better, just generally. He said: “We need to achieve more, it’s simple as that, we always need to aim for better, aim for higher, the whole team, and myself included. We always need to keep improving, that’s what drives us, so, expecting… better consistency, more points, better results – but how to get there, that’s the tricky bit. That comes from all the details and working really, really hard together as a team.”

It’ll be interesting to see what Bottas and Alfa Romeo can do in 2023, now with what will presumably be an improved package. The Finn has finished on the podium 67 times in his career – one of the distant goals will be to increase that tally. Of course, if he performs well again, he’ll get the contract extension that he desires – and has admitted that he’ll be seeking quite early into the year.

In case you missed it: