Bottas admits he started to "make plans" outside of Mercedes in preparation

Valtteri Bottas admits he was concerned about not being offered a contract extension with Mercedes for the 2020 Formula 1 season. The Finnish driver says he started to make plans elsewhere during the weeks before the summer break.  

On Thursday morning, Mercedes announced the contract extension of Bottas. During the season so far, Bottas has had Esteban Ocon breathing down his neck in the Mercedes garage. With this in the back of his mind, Bottas started to look elsewhere. 

"To be honest, going into the summer break once you've not signed and you know anything can happen. There's many different things the team look at but it was open between me and Esteban so I had to wait until last weekend," Bottas said during the press conference. 

"I had other options just in case so I was trying to make a plan and then things started to go the right way so it was better for me to commit and I'm very happy to know about the future and I don't need to worry about that anymore."