Bottas blames degrading dampers and old-spec engine for Baku nightmare with Cadillac

Valtteri Bottas has identified two compounding technical failures behind his difficult Azerbaijan Grand Prix weekend with Cadillac: progressive damper degradation that worsened his car’s ride characteristics throughout the race, and an older-specification Ferrari power unit that left him 6-7 km/h slower than team-mate Sergio Perez on Baku’s long straights.

The Finn was anchored to the foot of the timesheets across the weekend and ultimately retired on the final lap after crashing into the barrier at Turn 15, where a failure in engine braking on the rear axle contributed to the incident.

“I understand it looked pretty bad from the outside; I felt pretty bad in the car as well,” Bottas said. “There was just no way to keep up with the pack.”

Bottas explained that the team made significant changes ahead of qualifying — including damper and floor adjustments — which initially improved the car’s feel. However, the gains did not hold through race distance. “The ride again during the race degraded quite a lot. I think it’s something to do with dampers, degrading with heat,” he said, adding that a deteriorating power steering system compounded his difficulties in feeling the car.

The straight-line deficit to Perez had a clearer explanation. Perez ran Cadillac’s newer “ADUO 2” Ferrari power unit, while Bottas was still on the old-spec engine — a gap that translated directly into the consistent speed difference between the two cars on Baku’s lengthy flat-out sections.

Bottas also acknowledged a data blind spot on the car’s floor, noting that missing pressure tappings left the team without full aerodynamic feedback on certain components. “There are some bits of the floor where we are blind,” he said, though he stressed that the ride issue was the more significant factor in his performance.

The contrast with Perez was stark. The Mexican, who has historically excelled around the Azerbaijani capital, enjoyed one of his stronger weekends of the season, underlining the scale of the gap Bottas faced.

Bottas acknowledged the weekend was “pretty poor” but framed the technical findings as useful data for the team’s development, noting that Cadillac’s infrastructure was continuing to strengthen even as it works through the challenges of its first season as a constructor.