Valtteri Bottas thinks Williams will be closer to F1 pacesetters in China

Valtteri Bottas expects Williams to be closer to the pace at this weekend’s Chinese GP after they dropped well behind Ferrari and Mercedes in Malaysia.

Bottas overcame a slow start to finish fifth at Sepang, with the Finn battling team-mate Felipe Massa in the closing stages. Worringly, however, he finished 70s behind race winner Sebastian Vettel, even though Williams had been seen as neck-and-neck with Ferrari in the performance stakes in pre-season.

Speaking on Thursday, Bottas blamed the extreme heat - that had benefited Ferrari’s tyre management but also, he explained, adversely affected rear traction on Williams’ FW37.

“It was quite surprising, as for everyone else,” he said. “I think the way [Ferrari] could manage the tyre temperatures in Malaysia was better than any other team.

“I think that’s the main reason, and we also we struggled a bit more than we thought with the tyre temps and especially we’re still lacking some traction out of slow-speed corners.

“In Malaysia, if you overheat the rear tyres on traction then that builds up and you end up being slow in the race.

“That’s one area were looking into because there will be hot races, even in Europe.”

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With track temperatures at the Shanghai International Circuit expected to peak well below the 60-plus degrees C seen two weeks ago, Bottas added: “These tracks normally should be better for us and we do expect to be closer here to Ferrari and Mercedes. But how much? I don’t know. We’ll see.”

Regardless of track conditions, Bottas had a diffcult time of it in Malaysia with the 25-year-old making a poor getaway.

A back injury had forced his withdrawal in Melbourne and after Williams changed his driving position in order to prevent a relpase, Bottas said that they’re still “making a few more tweaks”.

Yet as far as the Grove team as a whole are concerned, the big question is how they can tackle their early deficit to Ferrari.

One suggestion has been that Mercedes might help the performance – specifically the driveability - of their power unit, which would also benefit the works team if Williams can take points off the Scuderia.

However, Bottas suspects that the differences are minimal at best.  

“Driveability is not maybe as good as the end of last year,” he admitted. “We are improving every time we go out basically. Again, we’re trying some different things here; hopefully it will be nice and smooth.

“I’ve heard that other Mercedes teams have had similar issues but I don’t know…I would think that all the information was shared, like normally that should be the case.

“I don’t think anybody is really a big step forward with the same engine.”

But does Bottas think Williams can battle back and beat the Scuderia? “It’s difficult to say. We’re definitely, at least at some places, aiming to be better than them.

“It’s a long season. It’s only the third race of the season and if we can keep progressing you never know. If they struggle with their development, we could catch up. We just need to keep doing our job, which is to develop the car.”