Valtteri Bottas broke an undesirable all-time Formula 1 record en route to an undesirable result in Sunday’s Mexican Grand Prix.
Valtteri Bottas got off to a hot start at Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez this past weekend, taking the pole position for the Mexican Grand Prix, the 18th of 22 races on the 2021 Formula 1 schedule.
But he only lasted a few seconds in P1, as a chaotic run down to turn one led to him being spun out by the McLaren of Daniel Ricciardo.
Bottas and Ricciardo saw both of their races ruined by this incident, and the former couldn’t get around the latter after their early pit stops.
The only bright side of Bottas’s day ended up being the fact that he ran the fastest lap around the 17-turn, 2.674-mile (4.303-kilometer) Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez road course in Mexico City, Mexico on the final lap.
Because he finished outside of the top 10 in 15th place, he did not score the fastest lap point for himself — or for Mercedes — but he did take away a point from race winner Max Verstappen and Red Bull by pulling it off.
So Verstappen leads Lewis Hamilton, Bottas’s teammate, by 19 points in the driver standings (312.5 to 293.5) with four races to go instead of 20, and Red Bull trail Mercedes by one point in the constructor standings (478.5 to 477.5); it otherwise would have been tied.
When it was all said and done, however, Bottas found himself having broken an undesirable all-time record.
He now has the most pole positions in Formula 1 history among drivers who have never won the world championship.
His pole position for Sunday’s 71-lap race was his third of the season and the 19th of his career, breaking the tie for first place on the all-time list (among non-world champions) with Rene Arnoux.
Bottas’s 19 poles rank 15th on the all-time list among all drivers, while Arnoux’s mark is tied with that of 1978 world champion Mario Andretti and 2007 world champion Kimi Raikkonen for 16th.
Entering the 2021 season, Bottas had trailed Arnoux’s record by two pole positions with 16 and sat in a second place tie with fellow non-world champions Stirling Moss and Felipe Massa.
Bottas’s best finish in the world championship standings is second place, and it is a finish that he has recorded twice, first in 2019 and then in 2020. He cannot mathematically finish higher than third, which is where he currently sits, in 2021.
Ironically, with his victory, Verstappen also added to a similar record — his record number of wins without a world championship.
Moss had held this record with 16 wins entering the year, but Verstappen’s ninth win of the season gives him 19 throughout his career. Verstappen broke this record with a home victory in the Dutch Grand Prix at Circuit Zandvoort in early September.
Verstappen is, however, listed by WynnBET as the favorite to win this year’s title, and if he does that, Moss would again hold this record, and the active leader in wins among non-world champions would become Bottas with 10.
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Verstappen is listed at -475 ($475 bet wins $100, pays $575) to win this year’s world title while the seven-time champion Hamilton is listed at +300 ($100 bet wins $300, pays $400).
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Tune in to ESPN at 12:00 p.m. ET this Sunday, November 14 for the live broadcast of the 19th race of the season, the Brazilian Grand Prix, from Autodromo Jose Carlos Pace, and be sure to start your free trial of FuboTV today!