F1: Mercedes switch gear in defence of Valtteri Bottas over China Covid-19 comments

Formula One constructors’ champions Mercedes on Wednesday manoeuvred to head off a brewing fallout over one of their driver’s ill-judged comments about China’s role in the Covid-19 pandemic.

Valtteri Bottas was widely criticised on Chinese social media after joking that he regretted the pandemic beginning when “someone bought a bat in Wuhan”, immediately following the Turkish Grand Prix last Sunday.

After a disappointing performance at Istanbul Park, where he finished 14th and handed the drivers’ championship to teammate Lewis Hamilton, Bottas joked in an interview that he would skip that day given the chance, before correcting himself and saying he would skip the day the pandemic originated in Wuhan.

The Covid-19 pandemic has so far claimed the lives of more than 1.3 million people worldwide and has caused major disruption to the global sports calendar, including the Formula One season.

Chinese social media was swift to lambast the Finnish driver before Mercedes took to its Sina Weibo platform on Wednesday to defend Bottas’ comments.