Bottas: "Something was missing today"

Valtteri Bottas will start the Brazilian Grand Prix in fourth place but the Finn admitted that there was something missing, as Mercedes couldn't keep up with the leaders at Interlagos.

Bottas and his teammate, Lewis Hamilton will start on the second row for the penultimate race of the season with Max Verstappen on pole position and Sebastian Vettel second. However, Bottas qualified fifth but benefitted from Charles Leclerc's grid penalty with the Finn eight tenths down on his rivals.

2019 is already Bottas' best season in the pinnacle of motorsport and the Finn will want to improve on his four wins. However, it looks as if he faces an uphill battle to do so.

"It was pretty close, as it always is here in Brazil, but something was missing today," Bottas told the Mercedes website.

"I had a tricky FP3 and was quite a bit behind, but I was getting closer and closer in Qualifying. However, in Q3, it just felt like I couldn’t get much more out of the car.

"My laps in Q3 actually felt pretty good, there were maybe a few hundreds left to extract from the car, but not enough to challenge for pole today.

"I’ll still start the race from the second row, so it will be interesting to see what I can do from there."