Valtteri Bottas has expressed confidence that he should be able to get to the end of the Formula 1 season without incurring any more penalties.
Bottas was relegated to the back of the grid in both Italy and Russia after taking on new power units and, after a penalty-free weekend in Turkey, copped another demotion in the United States.
Bottas was hit with a five-place drop after taking on a fresh Internal Combustion Engine, his sixth of the campaign, and started from ninth place on the grid as a result.
After taking three hits in four grands prix Bottas is nonetheless optimistic that the setbacks mean he will be able to run through the next five events without issues.
“I really hope we’re done for now,” said Bottas. “I think both engines that I’ve got in my engine pool, they seem to be OK, we haven’t detected any issues and any of them.
“So, fingers crossed I can go to the end without penalties, because now, in this tight championship battle, even if you just lose five places, it really compromises the race.
“I think it has been a case of just being unlucky, because before the bringing the engines to the track they have to pass all the tests, reliability tests, so in theory they should be OK, but luck hasn’t been on my side, I’ve had more failures.
“It’s just unlucky but we just hope now that everything is fixed. Time will tell.”
Bottas was able to recover positions, having dropped behind Yuki Tsunoda at the start, as he clawed his way up to sixth.
“What made it more tricky in the first stint was being behind the AlphaTauris, as I couldn’t get by,” said Bottas.
“Obviously that lost me quite a bit of time, and, unfortunately there was no help with Safety Cars or something. I made some progress but quite slowly.”
