Valtteri Bottas has had to wait eight races for his second win in the current 2020 Formula 1 season. Still, his time finally came in the Russian GP at Sochi. Bottas beat Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton and Red Bull’s Max Verstappen with a perfect performance on Sunday, taking victory and the DHL Fastest Lap.

Bottas only qualified in third place on Saturday, but unlike Hamilton in pole position, was able to start the race on the medium tire. After problems in qualifying, Hamilton had to manage with the much less durable soft tire.

Also, Bottas expected he would be able to take his chance at the start thanks to the strong slipstreaming effect at the track. However, that never happened, as Hamilton knew how to skillfully defend himself. Still, Bottas slotted into second place behind him and immediately used his better tires to good effect, increasing the pressure on Hamilton.

And then, a penalty came along to help Bottas win through. Hamilton received two five-second penalties for offenses committed before the start, which, together with his pit stop earlier, served to knock him out of the race for victory, handing P1 to Bottas on a plate. The Finn immediately picked up the pace and set best times consistently throughout the race.

He improved his personal best for the DHL Fastest Lap on a number of occasions until it finally stood at 1:37.030, so he also took the bonus point and thus left Sochi with 26 points. Late attacks by Hamilton and Max Verstappen failed. Verstappen missed Bottas’ time by 0.201 seconds.

“Once I was in clean air, the pace was really strong, and I was able to control everything without any real concerns,” said Bottas after the race. His win has brought him closer to his world championship rival, Hamilton: “Now I need to keep this momentum up. There are quite a few races to go and you just never know, so I’ll keep pushing, I won’t give up and we’ll see how it turns out in the end.”

Read more: https://inmotion.dhl/en/formula-1/fastest-lap-award


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