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Valtteri Bottas believes that a good start, combined with the first few turns that he will be facing at the Russian Grand Prix on Sunday, could help him to leapfrog the Ferrari's ahead and advance from his third-place starting position.
At the end of Saturday's qualifying session it was Sebastian Vettel who took pole for Ferrari, with Kimi Raikkonen finishing second fastest to complete a front row lockout for the Prancing Horse.
Bottas, however, was able to make gains on the two red cars during Q3, and he ultimately cut the gap between Ferrari and Mercedes to 0.095s upon setting the third-fastest time - thereby beating his team-mate Lewis Hamilton. He is confident going into the race, believing there is a good chance he can pass Vettel and Raikkonen as the lights go out.
"We can clearly see from the result that Ferrari was quicker today," Bottas said afterwards. "We were close in the end but not quite close enough. To be honest, all weekend they've had the upper hand, they've been able to extract much more, especially from the Ultrasoft tyres.
"That's what we really struggled with yesterday, and we made improvements, but obviously it was not quite enough. It's still a good team effort to get very close, we're on the second row and as always tomorrow is the day that really counts. The second row start here is not that bad a thing, it's a pretty long run into Turn 2."
Mason Hawker
Grand Prix of Belgium
C. Sainz jr
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