Bottas is 15/1 to 20/1 at the bookies.
That actually seems rather tempting... I think he's being priced with team orders in mind, but if Bottas is somehow able to get ahead of Hamilton on merit (don't laugh - it happens a few times a season!) then Merc might not actually need to swap them as Hamilton only needs to finish ahead of Verstappen to be Champion.
And that's before we get onto the fact that he should be favourite if the top two take each other out!
Good point is that, pretty much the only scenario where a late race team order swap makes sense is in the very unlikely scenario where Bottas runs 10th, Hamilton 11th, Verstappen 12th, lower or out, and no realistic prospect of both Mercs catching and passing whoever is in 9th before the end. Even throwing Bottas onto a sub-optimal strategy to mess with RB's heads might not have its usual effect, since Max just has to cover Lewis if he is ahead (or if behind throw their own gamble regardless of what Bottas does or doesn't do)
In fact if anything, for all the implied talk of Suzuka 1989 and 1990, it's not out of the realms of possibility that Hamilton pulls what Senna did at Suzuka 1991 and give Bottas a thankyou parting gift, if they are in a clear 1-2.
Edited by Cornholio, 06 December 2021 - 13:44.
