Valtteri Bottas and George Russell discuss about their F1 future and contract talks, as Jost Capito hopes to retain the latter at Williams.
With their contracts up at the end of this F1 season with Mercedes and Williams respectively, Bottas and Russell are the drivers that are said to be competing for the 2022 German manufacturer’s line-up alongside Lewis Hamilton.
Even though Hamilton is still to be confirmed, but the recent discussions points towards the Bit continuing on, where the specifics of the deal needed to be firm. Should he continue, it will leave Mercedes, with either Bottas and or Russell to go with for the second seat.
The two driver are in a different moment of their F1 career, and they are approaching the negotiation in two different ways. For Bottas, he hopes for an early solution, with summer break the targeted timeline from his side for Mercedes to finalise, even though, he isn’t focusing too much on it, at the current moment.
“Honestly, it’s always better earlier,” said Bottas in the press conference. “I’ve had contracts signed early, I’ve had contracts too late that it almost becomes a distraction. But to be honest, I haven’t really thought about it yet. And that’s an honest answer.
“I’m really just focusing on these races now and that moment when we start to talk it will come eventually. For sure about my future, yes, I think August break is normally a good deadline. But to be honest I don’t want to think about it yet. I just want to win races, that’s the only thing on my mind at the moment,” summed up Bottas.
On the side of Russell, who was pleased with regards to Lando Norris’ re-signing with McLaren, wants any deal with any team to be a multi-year one. While Mercedes will depend on Toto Wolff, Williams is certainly opened to having him for more years.
“Definitely the position I’m in currently, being a free agent as such going into next year, is a good position to be in,” Russell said. I think stability and longevity is important. I think it’s so clear with people moving around recently how difficult it is to jump in and adapt to a new team.
“So I think wherever I find myself next year, I’d like it to be at least for a couple of years, because I think that’s so important to have that consistency in order to grow and progress,” summed up Russell, where Jost Capito is hoping to retain him at Williams.
“I think George is a Mercedes driver for many years and I don’t think they will let him go,” said Capito. “But we will see. We’ve got time to talk about drivers. We are not in the need now to discuss that. He is doing a great job. He is a fantastic driver. We created a really good relationship and I think he would fit very well to Williams for our future as well and if he believes in our future there might be a chance to keep him.”
The 2021 F1 season has been quite the journey for both Bottas and Russell, where the former has scored three third places in the first four races along with a DNF due to a crash with the latter at the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix in Imola.
Here’s Lewis Hamilton on contract signing
Here’s Toto Wolff on situation with Mercedes/Alpine
The story was co-written by Lorenzo Liegi