Valtteri Bottas is confident he will stay at Mercedes for a third season in 2019. The Finn was signed as replacement for 2016 world champion Nico Rosberg, who shocked everyone when he declared his retirement a week after winning Formula 1 title.
Bottas is currently in fourth place in the Formula 1 standings, and thinks he is meeting the goals set by his contract for 2018 season.
“We discussed this before the start of this season and we all agreed that there should be a progression compared to last year,” Bottas said.
“This is my second season on this team, and for the moment I’m meeting the goals we set for ourselves, the team and me together, and we agreed that we wanted to see progression on my part, because this is my second season on the team and after all that I learned last year.” Bottas added.
Bottas, who concedes 42 points to his teammate Lewis Hamilton in the standings, hopes he will soon be fixated on his future at Silver Arrow in 2019 season. Since joining Mercedes in 2017, he has enjoyed every day working with the team.
The 28-year-old driver also admitted partnering Hamilton has also been really good, and he is enjoying the respect they have and the will to push the team forward together.
“I would like to continue with this team, it’s my long-term goal, and I would like to be quickly set, it’s obvious. As long as I keep performing like I’ve been performing this season so far, naturally it should be okay, all good.” Bottas said.
“And of course it would be nice for Lewis to stay as well because I enjoy working with him, the fact that he has won four championships and I don’t push myself to outdo myself. We work well together and that’s why I would prefer stay with Lewis on this team.” he added.
Mercedes boss Toto Wolff on the other hand, he revealed the team haven’t yet talked about the feature of Bottas in next year, but admitted the team keeps its option open in the driver market for 2019.
“We speak a lot. We are very open always about the car performance. We haven’t yet talked anything about next year, we think it’s still a bit early.” Wolff said.
