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Hakkinen: "Bottas will turn it around"

11:35, 05 May 2018

byNicolás Quarles van Ufford

After a heart-breaking retirement for Valtteri Bottas in Baku only laps before winning it, fellow countryman and F1 legend Mika Hakkinen thinks that Bottas will bounce back stronger in Spain.

Bottas must've thought that he was cruising towards his fourth career win, until he hit a rather large piece of debris that wasn't cleaned up from the track from an earlier crash. The debris punctured Bottas's tyre and ended his race.

"It’s a natural reaction, but it is really important not to let it affect you too much and to start psyching yourself up again," Hakkinen wrote in his column on Unibet.

"It’s important to have positive thoughts, to remember how well you drove and not to be too sad or emotional.

"When things go wrong you just need to examine whether you or the team could have done something better, and then move on.

"Ultimately you can use the disappointments to make you even stronger, and I am sure that’s what Valtteri will do."

Hakkinen shows a lot of faith in his fellow countryman, who has been very strong this season compared to last. Can Bottas improve on his three wins of 2017 this year?