F1 Azerbaijan GP Driver Ratings – Redemption for Bottas

#1 Mercedes

F1 Grand Prix of Azerbaijan

Valtteri Bottas – 1st

Last year’s race in Baku was a dark day for Valtteri Bottas. The Mercedes man was leading the race that day and looked to have the race in full control. But then a crash between Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo in the Red Bulls left plenty of debris on the straight.

Sadly for the Finn, Bottas’ tyres caught some of the debris – puncturing one of his tyres in the process. The one race that got away as Hamilton took home the 1st place trophy.

Bottas took it very hard on himself in the post race interviews and would not win any races last season. But this year redemption was on his side as he won his second race of the year. This is a very different Bottas in 2019.

Driver rating: 8/10

Lewis Hamilton – 2nd

In a weird way, it was a quiet weekend for Lewis Hamilton after picking up the runner’s up trophy. The Briton started the race behind Bottas but challenged the Finn from the word go after nearly overtaking his team mate on the first corner.

If this was 12 months ago, Bottas probably would have backed off and conceded the overtake but the 2019 version of Bottas is a lot more determined.

Still a good result for Hamilton as Baku does not seem to be his favourite track on the calendar. Hamilton has only ever won once in Azerbaijan, which was last year.

Driver rating – 6/10