Bottas swaps one-hour flight for 350km cycle to Singapore
Valtteri Bottas is cycling to the Singapore Grand Prix. The 37-year-old Cadillac driver is riding 350km (217 miles) from Malaysia to Singapore instead of taking a one-hour flight.
He set off hours after spinning out of Sunday's chaotic Bahrain Grand Prix. The flight takes an hour. The bike will take days.
The route starts at the Sepang International Circuit outside Kuala Lumpur, according to Motorsport.com. Bottas completed Leg 1 on Sunday night. On Monday, on stage two, he spent nearly six hours in the saddle to cover 161.91km, the timing from his ride shows.
He has a deadline. Bottas needs to be in Singapore for media commitments on Thursday ahead of the race weekend, the BBC reported.
He is not riding alone. His partner Tiffany Cromwell, a professional cyclist, is making the journey with him. Much of the route is off-road and on gravel, meaning loose, unpaved tracks rather than smooth tarmac.
The trip follows another difficult weekend on track. Bottas and Cadillac team-mate Sergio Pérez started P21 and P22 in Bahrain. Bottas failed to finish after his spin. He sits 22nd in the drivers' standings with no points after 16 grands prix and eight retirements this season.
Cycling is more than a warm-down for Bottas. During Formula 1's summer break he finished fifth in his age group at an off-road qualifying event in the Czech Republic, earning a place at the Gravel World Championships. He cannot take it up because those championships fall on the same weekend as Singapore.
He is closely involved with FNLD GRVL, a gravel race held each summer in his native Finland. When the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix was cancelled in 2023, he entered a gravel race in Scotland instead.
What makes this stand out is the contrast. For most drivers, the hop from Malaysia to Singapore is routine. Bottas has turned it into a multi-day test of legs and lungs, just days before one of the most physically demanding races of the year.
