© Steve Etherington for Mercedes-Benz Grand Prix Ltd.
Mercedes’ 2020 dominance has been broken by Red Bull and Max Verstappen. Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas react to a “frustrating” race.
“It was a huge challenge,” said Hamilton after the race.
“If you look at their tyres, they didn’t have the problems that we did have. It was unexpected that we had so many blisters on the tyres. We haven’t had this before, the team will no doubt look at it.
“We’re going to look at it, I don’t know if there were others who suffered as much as we did.”
Bottas, who started the race from pole, got passed by Lewis Hamilton in the last few laps of the race and finished third.
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“It was very frustrating,” Bottas said in the post-race interview.
“Starting on pole and finishing third is not ideal. I think as a team we were sleeping at some point when Max managed to get ahead of us and our strategy was far, far, far from ideal so there is lots to learn from today I think.
“Of course, I was trying. There was a chance to keep up with Max but as soon as I started to push towards the end the tyres just fell apart.
“There was lots of blistering in the tyres for us and it seems like Red Bull had none so they clearly had the edge [on us].”
The Finn then explained what it’s like to race on blistered tyres.
“The tyres just overheat, like they are boiling, then you just get holes in the tyre. Then you just lose grip and once you start to have those blisters in that particular tyre you lose cornering grip and go slower and slower.
“We will move on but it’s been a disappointing day.”
With today’s result Bottas drops to third in the Drivers’ Champiobship standings.
