Bottas: I need to raise my game

It was not a bad season for Bottas, who claimed his first F1 victory at the Russian Grand Prix and went on to win another two times in Austria and Abu Dhabi, finishing third in the championship standings albeit 58 points adrift of his World Championship winning teammate Lewis Hamilton.

The Finn, speaking candidly during a Petronas function in Malaysia, said of his season, "I need to raise my game. I need to be performing better on average. I had some really good periods where I was performing well and being consistent, but I also had periods where I wasn't performing as well as I should have."

"Overall, if I had to rate my season out of 10 I would maybe say 7.5. I think there's a lot of things I can do better next year."

"There were many races where I did struggle, and I didn't perform at the level I wanted and the level I had to be at if I was going to fight for the title.

"But from those tricky races, I've learned massively. I think Abu Dhabi, and qualifying in Sao Paulo before that, was confirmation that I had learned a lot from those tricky races."

"I need to attack those issues. I need to learn every single thing I can from 2017, which I'm sure I will by working hard over the winter with the team, and then I want to be a better, more complete, driver. Whatever that brings next year, we'll find out."

"Everyone set a certain goal for the year and that was to defend the title, even with the major rule changes for the year. Everyone was working together, very united, very motivated, with the right mentality. Nothing else is enough but winning."

"The team has been great at approaching difficult times. I think we've had bad races, but it has motivated everyone, even more, to work harder," added Bottas.