Bottas to treat every race "like it's his last" in 2019

Mercedes driver Valtteri Bottas has insisted he will treat every race like "it's his last race" in 2019, following a difficult 2018 campaign.

Bottas ended the season without a win for Mercedes, and has acknowledged that the 2018 campaign was his most disappointing in his Formula One career.

The Finn knows full well that his long-term future at Mercedes is far from safe, especially with Esteban Ocon chasing his seat for 2020, but Bottas has vowed to go all-out attack to prove to everyone how good he really is.

"This sport is funny, you never know what happens in the future," Bottas explained to Motorsport.com. "But I think the right mentality for me to approach next year is like I have nothing to lose.

"I just want to go for it and drive like I stole it, like it's my last race, last day ever. So, yeah, I think that's it. That's a good plan."

Bottas' season fell below his and his own team's expectations of his ability, but the Finn has insisted there are still some positives to take from the winless 2018 season.

"I think the fact is, as a team, what we've analysed and what we spoke with the guys, qualifying pace and race pace, compared to my team-mate, has been better this year on average, which is positive, but the results haven't," Bottas added. 

"So all those things, we need to analyse why the results weren't there. Obviously sometimes it was unlucky, sometimes were different reasons. But, yeah, I think performance-wise this year was better, but results-wise last year was better."