Bottas lost his lead because of Verstappen: 'He could really threaten him'
F1 News
- GPblog.com
Lewis Hamilton benefited from his own strategy during the Imola Grand Prix. Valtteri Bottas was pitted earlier, but Mercedes explains in the debrief why they had no other choice.
Bottas has bad luck
During the Grand Prix of Emilia, Romagna Bottas was in the lead after the start of the race, with Max Verstappen and Hamilton right behind him. Verstappen was able to force him into an early stop. Hamilton then got free play from his team and took advantage of the Virtual Safety Car.
''In that first stint, we looked at Verstappen because he could really threaten Bottas. That's why we let Bottas push, to really create a gap. A gap of 2.5 seconds is enough to repel an undercut. If you don't have that gap, you'll be forced into the early pit stop yourself,'' says Andrew Shovlin in the Mercedes video.
Hamilton at an advantage
''We had already decided before the race that this would be the scenario if the race went like this. We had to respond to Verstappen's stop with Bottas and then we looked with Lewis at what was best for him. If we had got him right he would have found out about Verstappen and Bottas, but now he had two advantages''.
According to the Mercedes engineer, the team responded to a possible Safety Car. ''If you stay outside, you have a chance of having a Safety Car and keeping the lead. In addition, you have an advantage with the fresher tyre. Lewis, however, was faster than Bottas because of his damage, so he was even trying to create the hole for a regular pit stop'', concludes Shovlin.