Palmer sees disastrous outcome for Bottas and luck for Hamilton
F1 News
- GPblog.com
Valtteri Bottas lost important points and Lewis Hamilton came free with the scare. Both Mercedes drivers lived through the same incident but the result was totally different; it made a difference of 25 F1 points. Jolyon Palmer analyses the last laps of the GP of Great Britain.
Flat tire Bottas just too late
In his column on the F1-website the ex F1-driver talks about the past Grand Prix. Palmer starts: "If Bottas had his flat tyre in Stowe, the corner in front of it, he could have gone straight into the pit and made a stop with minimal loss. He would still have finished third, but probably with the fastest lap".
If Bottas would have been able to do this, he would have had the fastest lap indeed, as he would not have given Max Verstappen the opportunity to make a 'free' pit stop because he would have been too close to the Dutchman. The extra bad luck for Bottas was that he got his flat tire too late on track.
Verstappen had his own problems
Palmer continues: "Besides, Verstappen had enough woes of his own with his tires. Continuing to the end without a pit stop would also have been a big risk for him. If something would have gone wrong as with the two Mercedes and Carlos Sainz, Bottas would have had his P2 back".
It is the unbelievable bad luck that Bottas has and the luck that race and championship leader Lewis Hamilton has what Palmer would like to emphasize. Palmer describes it as follows: "How Bottas' GP was ruined and Hamilton's GP was saved in a matter of seconds."