Valtteri𒁏 Bottas was left to rue a Mercedes power unit failure which has severely dented hi🌳s chances of winning the 2020 F1 drivers’ title.

Bottas had maintained the lead into Turn 1, with a stern de🐭fence against teammate Lewis Hamilton but it all went wrong on Lap 13 for the Fi🐟nn.

Bottas locked up heavily into the first corner, surrendering the lead﷽ to Hamilton and was forced to maಌke a premature stop for fresh tyres.

As he made his way through the field, Bottas ꩲthen s🅰uffered a loss of power where he was eventually forced to retire on Lap 19.

Reflecting♊ on the failure, he said: “Yeah, unlucky, what can I say? During the VSC I started to lose power and it never recovered. It was quite a big loss of power, something to do with the power unit. I don’t have ꧑any details yet. Unlucky. It was good fun until then.”

While it may have been a disജappointing day for Bottas, it was one of the rare times we’ve seen him come out on top against Hamilton.

Off the start, Hamilton looked to have the upper hand into Turn 1 as he pushed his teammate wide but then Bottas showed great aggression to remain on the outside and re-overtook him into the fol𓃲lowing corner.

Looking back at the battle with Hamilton on the first lap, Bottas added: “I💝t was a great start, we had a good battle. There was no way ꦜI was going to let it be easy for him so I am glad I could maintain the lead.

“Obviously, later on, I had the lock-up into Turn 1 so I lost the position but it meant I stopped early on the new tyres and they star𝓡ted to feel pretty good so I had no doubt I could have carried good pace and p🍎robably undercut.”

With Hamilton claiming his 91st victory, he now sits 69 points clear of Bottas at the top of the champi🍌onship🌞.