'Expectations Are High': Bottas Hints Decent Progress At Sauber

Wednesday, 07 February 2024 at 18:00

Valtteri Bottas asserted he has high hopes for the upcoming season, given the many changes his team has undergone over the last few months.

This week, the Sauber/ Stake F1 team unveiled their new car - C44. The team wasn't able to make huge progress over the last season, but they hope that "aggressive" changes will improve their car's performance.

During the event, Sauber's technical director, James Key, presented some new elements of the C44. He suggested the biggest areas of change are the front suspension and the aero package.

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Valtteri Bottas expects great progress from his team after the 2023 season, which he admitted wasn't as successful as his team would have hoped. He told the media:

"My own expectations are high, we definitely need to make a good step and see good progress from last year, a season in which, in all honesty, we didn't meet the targets that we set for ourselves."

During the most recent season, Sauber (back then named Alfa Romeo) finished in P9 and failed to collect points in all of the last five races as they lost ground to their competitors in terms of race pace.

"We need to fix that now, we need to step up our game and do better. Seeing all the changes that have been happening in the team is what gives me this confidence."

After ending its collaboration with Alfa Romeo, Sauber enters a new era in 2024. Now rebranded as the Stake F1 team, it has an entirely different livery design. But as Bottas hinted, that is not the only change.

"We have got quite a bit of new resources in different departments of the team, we have a whole new identity, the new car looks different – and not just in terms of livery. All this gives me the confidence that we're on a different path, hopefully the right path."