The bona fide championship battle between Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton has some observers wondering if ‘mind games’ will be employed by the two drivers in a bid to gain an edge on the other in the title fight – but that is something Verstappen says he has no desire to partake in.
The two have already had something of an exchange of words after Hamilton suggested in Monaco that he’d been forced to avoid colliding with Verstappen this season, which brought out a pointed response from the Red Bull driver, while Mercedes Team Principal Toto Wolff has already dubbed the off-track drama a ‘soap opera’.
Valtteri Bottas spent the last winter break working hard on his mental strength in his bid to become world champion in 2021. But after having had the worst start to a season since joining Mercedes, the Finn admitted ahead of the Azerbaijan Grand Prix that he’d been forced to call on those reserves of mental strength this year.
Bottas has suffered two DNFs so far in 2021, at the Emilia Romagna and Monaco Grands Prix – while with Mercedes team mate Lewis Hamilton having won three out of five races this year, Bottas has yet to finish higher than P3.
And with Bottas having scored the fewest amount of points in the first five races of a season since joining Mercedes – he s currently in fourth place in the drivers’ standings, behind McLaren’s Lando Norris, and with 47 points to championship leader Max Verstappen’s 105 – the Finn said that it hadn’t been an easy start to the year.
The red-hot championship battle between Red Bull and Mercedes has led Mercedes Team Principal Toto Wolff to say he’s relishing a “gloves off” bout with Red Bull boss Christian Horner.
Formula 1
Monte Carlo, Monaco
Monaco Grand Prix – Mercedes Team Principal Toto Wolff has laid some of the blame for Valtteri Bottas’s race-ending pitstop at the Finn’s door.
The Mercedes driver had to retire from second place at the Monaco Grand Prix following a calamitous pitstop where the mechanics were unable to remove the front right. It was revealed that the nut holding the wheel in place had been machined to the axel.
The Mercedes boss believes that Bottas had stopped short of his marks at his pitstop which caused issues when removing the tyre.
“Valtteri stopped a little too early,” said Wolff to Auto Motor und Sport as quoted by PlanetF1.com. “This meant the mechanic had to apply the impact wrench at an angle. The awkward angle damaged the wheel nut and we couldn’t bring it down.”
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