Several problems with the Alfa Romeo C42 prevented the team from carrying out all the filming they had planned for the 2022 pre-season tests, so the Swiss team’s new driver pair, Valtteri Bottas, recently arrived from Mercedes, and Guanyu Zhou, rookie this year, they did few laps in total.
The team’s mileage improved in the second week of testing in Bahrain, and they topped Saturday’s lap standings with 150. However, they continued to experience setbacks, as seen at Turn 8 of the Sakhir track 40 minutes from end of the tests, where the Finn lost control of the car.
Although Bottas was reasonably happy with the feel of the Alfa Romeo, he admitted that reliability was one of the main concerns ahead of the 2022 grand prix.
“I will be more confident once we talk in the team next week and hear that all the problems we understand perfectly, making sure they don’t come up again,” explained the two-time runner-up in the world.
“Right now my biggest concern is doing a full race distance because we’ve had various types of setbacks in these tests,” he said. “We have been able to fix them and I expect new problems to arise.”
All that aside, Valtteri Bottas was convinced that Alfa Romeo “has taken a step forward”, and says he is starting to get a good feeling with his car.
“In terms of performance, my feeling is that the team has made a clear step up from last year’s car, and that’s good to see,” explained the fifth-placed driver on the final day of testing in Bahrain, more than a second behind the leader, Max Verstappen with the Red Bull RB18 .
“Much better than in Barcelona, and also I have the right feeling with the car. I did some pretty solid long runs, and I didn’t feel anything bad, I was starting to like the car, both in high and low temperatures,” said Bottas.
“I would have liked to do more laps, but I am ready, and we have to make sure that those problems do not appear again, learning from mistakes. That’s the first thing, and we will have few practice sessions to have the set-up ready next time. week”, sentenced the Finn.
