Valtteri Bottas admits he'll need some time away from the Formula 1 track before he can properly look back on a miserable 2018 season.
The Finn suffered another difficult race in Abu Dhabi as a mistake at Turn 5 allowed Sebastian Vettel to pass and then Max Verstappen muscled his way through at Turn 13 with the slight contact forcing him to pit for a second time.
A lowly fifth place finish would be the end result confirming Bottas as the only top-six driver not to win this season and the first Mercedes driver to go a year without a win since 2012.
“I think that race sums up my season pretty well,” Valtteri said post-race at Yas Marina.
“I had a lock-up into Turn 5 and in Turn 8 when Max got close. I don’t know why, the team said they could see some issue but I don’t know what and then I touched with Max and there was a slow puncture and in the end… that was it really."
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Overall it was a season dominated by bad luck initially which then left Bottas playing the 'wingman' to teammate Lewis Hamilton with a puncture in the final laps in Baku while leading and then giving up victory in Sochi the two notable near-misses.
“Honestly you’re asking that too early after the end of the year," he replied when asked to summarise his 2018
“I want to have some time off and time to think about things. It’s been a mentally tough year so I need some break.”
As for how Bottas intends to put it right next year, he added: “For sure it has been on my mind but after this kind of season I don’t have the energy to look too far away.
“I’m just going to take it easy for a while and then I start to look forward. For now, it’s just difficult to see the positives but I will.”
