2017 Abu Dhabi F1 GP: Bottas closes the season with victory

The Finnish driver Valtteri Bottas has won the 2017 Abu Dhabi F1 GP race, the last of this season. With this triumph at the Yas Marina Circuit, the Finn closes the year with three victories, delivering the best run of his career since he entered Formula 1 back in 2013.

It was in the last race of the year that the two Mercedes stood out the most. Both Bottas and Lewis Hamilton were at the front for the entire race, with the rest of the field far behind. The Briton tried on more than one occasion to overtake his teammate, but Bottas delivered a race of great quality and took a more than deserved victory.

Even so, the Finn could not take the runner-up spot from Sebastian Vettel. Although Bottas did his job and won the race, Vettel finished third and only needed to be in the points to secure second place, in a year in which, at times, the Finn dreamed of winning the world championship and ending the dominance of Mercedes, which has now lasted four years.

Fernando Alonso finished in the points, in ninth place, just ahead of Felipe Massa, who was racing in his final Formula 1 race. The other Spaniard on the grid, Carlos Sainz, could not finish the race due to mechanical problems, retiring after only 32 laps of the Yas Marina circuit, already looking ahead to 2018 and to brighter prospects.

And with this race, the curtain falls on the 2017 F1 World Championship, which ended with Lewis Hamilton taking the final title and a new constructors’ title for the German team Mercedes. The big circus will not return until March 2018, although there will be pre-season testing and surely some news worth reporting before then.