F1 News
Bottas to return to former team after parting ways with Sauber?
- Nicole Mulder
After it was announced that Valtteri Bottas and Guanyu Zhou will leave Sauber after this season, the Finn appears to be making a return to his old Formula 1 team: Mercedes. There, he is expected to start working as a reserve driver from 2025.
Bottas to make Mercedes return in 2025?
Sauber announced on Wednesday that Bottas and his teammate, Guanyu Zhou will not return for next season. The team have previously announced the signing of Nico Hulkenberg to the Audi project which transition will be competed heading into the 2026 Formula 1 season, and today, the team have also announced Gabriel Bortoleto, who currently leads the F2 championship.
Bottas' next step, meanwhile, already seems clear: it is likely that he will return to his old team. GPblog has learnt that Mercedes would like to welcome him back, after he was previously Lewis Hamilton's teammate for five years. The German team see him as a valued former member of the Mercedes family and would see Bottas as an asset to any team in the role of reserve driver.
Earlier this season, the 35-year-old Finn expressed the need to "look at all the alternatives including going back to the Mercedes family". That return seems to happen as a reserve driver. George Russell and rookie Andrea Kimi Antonelli will be the line-up for the Germans in 2025.
Bottas competed for five seasons for Mercedes, until he had to make way for George Russell. In 2022, the Finn made the switch to Sauber, at the time known as Alfa Romeo. There, the experienced driver was a steady driver, but after three years, team and driver decided to part ways.
This article was written in collaboration with Kada Sarkozi
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