SOCHI REVIEW BY BEN STEVENS
Sunday
At a time when the two dominant figures
in F1 have made winning a matter of course,
Valtteri Bottas showed just how special a
single victory can be.
82 races, 27 years, and four months
under the Mercedes microscope – however
you cut it, this has been a long time coming
for Bottas. All that expectation was clearly
weighing on the Finn, and now it’s been
lifted. His two-word remark as he crossed the
finish line perfectly summed it up: “f***
me”.
That said, it wasn’t the most exciting of
races. Bottas won it at the start and spent the
rest of the afternoon hanging onto his lead
like it was the last bottle of vodka. The Ferrari
was clearly the faster car once they’d all
pitted for supersofts, and you have to wonder
if Seb Vettel would’ve had him if he’d been
pitted a few laps earlier. It’s hard to say given
Sochi as a track provides less overtaking
than the hallways at an old folks’ home, but I
think it should give Mercedes some pause for
what was in all honesty an unlikely victory.
Still, full credit to Bottas. Blowhards
like myself have spent most of the last two
weeks wondering just whether he was cut-
out to leave Mercedes to victory, and now he’s
shut us up – at least for the time being. It’ll
be fascinating to see how he backs this up in
Barcelona.