Ahead of the Bahrain GP, Valtteri Bottas admitted that he feels more confident inside the new C44 and wants a positive year to aim at a future Audi deal for the 2026 season.
The Finnish experience with Alfa Romeo (now Sauber) hasn’t been the best so far, as the team struggled to find performance with the new regulations. However, he admitted that after testing, his feeling inside the car is better than last year, and he wants a positive start to the season to open up as many options as possible for his future contract talks.
“It’s going to be interesting [the drivers’ market], and things will start moving relatively soon because many contracts are expiring, including mine. So I want to have a good first part of the year, and then we see.
“I’m looking around to see what are the better options, and what are the opportunities. My priority would be getting involved in the Audi project because, for me, it’s really tempting and ideal.”
Bottas continued by saying that he also feels more confident thanks to the great work done by the team over the winter. Sauber is now in “a better place” compared to 2023, and the C44’s working window is wider, which allows the team to better balance the car and try many things.
“Compared to the last two years, we are in a better place with the overall balance of the car. Also from track to track, we should be able to get the car more balanced, and that’s a solid starting point.
“We can set the car to a lower ride height compared to 2023, and with the C44 we can extract a bit more [performance], and we also have fewer issues with the bouncing.
“During the winter we’ve made good progress. We found more downforce, so I’m definitely much happier in the car now. We do have more options mechanically, and we can play with the set-up a bit more.”