Bottas says Hamilton title fight will boost performances

Valtteri Bottas says he will perform even better for Mercedes if he can manage to stick in the title fight with Lewis Hamilton until the end of the season.

Bottas is realistically Hamilton's only remaining challenger this season, but must make up a 63-point deficit over the remaining seven races, starting with Singapore where the Brit took one of his more dominant victories 12 months ago.

Having faded from the fight in 2017 and never really featuring last year, Bottas can feel the weight of momentum behind him, having secured another year at the Silver Arrows as well.

And the Finn says he will not give up until Hamilton is crowned the champion.

"It's definitely a better feeling for the end of the year," he said. "I also feel very good support from the team and the points gap between me and Lewis is not night and day.

"You never know what will happen in the championship. There might be opportunities for the championship, no point giving up, we have seven races and things can happen.

"It's encouraging for me to see I can perform. There's no doubt from my side that I can, when I will be able to be at my best, when title hopes and motivation is there, I know I can do it.

"I look forward to Singapore, another race that has been difficult in the past, Lewis has been really strong there. We'll give a big effort there to have a good and strong weekend."

Related

More F1 news

Latest F1 news

Aston Martin are only 'patching up wounds', top F1 insider taps brakes on Newey hype train

• 46 minutes ago

Max Verstappen 'has lost control' claims top F1 insider as transfer market flips

• 1 hour ago

F1 News Today: Aston Martin dark web data revealed as insider drops major Alonso update

• 2 hours ago

F1 insider claims plan to take cars electric aged badly but says there is a fix

• Yesterday 22:30

F1 star reveals new business venture and you guessed, it's in Monaco

• Yesterday 21:45

Lewis Hamilton's eighth F1 title is ON as 'major' Ferrari upgrades revealed

• Yesterday 20:57