{"id":26407,"date":"2024-11-06T08:21:54","date_gmt":"2024-11-06T13:21:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/?p=26407"},"modified":"2024-11-06T08:23:27","modified_gmt":"2024-11-06T13:23:27","slug":"valtteri-bottas-in-talks-for-mercedes-reserve-role","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/11\/06\/valtteri-bottas-in-talks-for-mercedes-reserve-role\/","title":{"rendered":"Valtteri Bottas in talks for Mercedes reserve role"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>When the season began, Valtteri Bottas was relatively confident about securing a 2025 seat. <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/11\/06\/bottas-and-zhou-to-leave-sauber-at-the-end-of-2024\/\" target=\"_self\">Unfortunately for Bottas, the doors have slowly closed<\/a> for a full-time contract next season &#8211; meaning he is forced to look at alternatives. Among the best paths available to the Finn is a <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/10\/29\/f1-news-valtteri-bottas-open-to-mercedes-reserve-role\/\" target=\"_self\">Mercedes return<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h2>Bottas in talks for Mercedes comeback<\/h2>\n<p>Although Sauber officially announced <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/11\/06\/gabriel-bortoleto-will-race-for-sauber-in-2025\/\" target=\"_self\">Gabriel Bortoleto&#8217;s<\/a> arrival a few hours ago, Bottas has been considering other options for some time.<\/p>\n<p>After all, even though the 10-time winner was hopeful of an extension, the team&#8217;s hesitance throughout 2024 spoke volumes.<\/p>\n<p>Bottas knew his chances of a contract extension were uncertain, meaning negotiations have been taking place in the background for several weeks.<\/p>\n<p>Because of this, there is a clearly defined path to stay in the F1 paddock:<\/p>\n<p><em>&#8220;But, of course, as I don\u2019t have anything signed&#8230; I\u2019ve got to look at all the alternatives,&#8221; <\/em>he told the media in Mexico.<\/p>\n<p><a id=\"yFqIGlQlRQNFM5AajwR9KA\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/2182674360\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'yFqIGlQlRQNFM5AajwR9KA',sig:'BOg2UxMTqNTWBef0OLtDwIfzFStPlajY4Wq4inAX2hI=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'2182674360',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n<p><em>&#8220;Including going back to the Mercedes family. That\u2019s for sure one option, and I would consider it.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Since making these comments, the Finn&#8217;s chances of joining the Silver Arrows as a reserve driver have steadily grown.<\/p>\n<p>With several race victories and dozens of podiums under his belt, Valtteri Bottas is arguably over-qualified for this role. However, with a full-time seat off the table, this could be his next best option.<\/p>\n<p>After all, other drivers have managed to return to Formula 1 after spending a year (or several) on the sidelines.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/04\/16\/f1-news-nico-hulkenberg-2025-team-change-seen-as-formality\/\" target=\"_self\">Nico Hulkenberg<\/a> is the most recent example of this, joining Haas in 2023 after three seasons without a full-time drive. Since then, the 37-year-old has repaid Haas for offering him a final lifeline in F1.<\/p>\n<p>Before earning this full-time deal, Hulkenberg&#8217;s market\u00a0 benefited from a series of exceptional &#8216;substitute&#8217; performances.<\/p>\n<p>Two of these appearances were with Racing Point in 2020, and another two at Aston Martin in 2022 &#8211; filling in for <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/11\/04\/lance-stroll-suspects-brake-failure-caused-brazil-spin\/\" target=\"_self\">Lance Stroll<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/2024\/09\/06\/mattia-binotto-addresses-sebastian-vettel-rumours\/\" target=\"_self\">Sebastian Vettel<\/a> respectively.<\/p>\n<p>Although there is no guarantee Bottas enjoys the same fairy-tale comeback at Hulkenberg, becoming a Mercedes reserve driver would keep him active in the paddock.<\/p>\n<p>Depending on how the market evolves, this could represent Bottas&#8217; best chance to capitalise on any openings on the grid.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When the season began, Valtteri Bottas was relatively confident about securing a 2025 seat. Unfortunately for Bottas, the doors have slowly closed for a full-time contract next season &#8211; meaning he is forced to look at alternatives. Among the best paths available to the Finn is a Mercedes return. Bottas in talks for Mercedes comeback [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4927,"featured_media":26408,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,3],"tags":[2220,68,465,121],"class_list":["post-26407","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-formula-1","category-news","tag-2024-formula-1-season","tag-f1","tag-f1-news","tag-mercedes"],"modified_by":"Jaden Diaz-Ndisang","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26407","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4927"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26407"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26407\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26408"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/motorsports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}