Rival spots potential weak point in Aston Martin's F1 recovery

Valtteri Bottas hailed the recovery upgrade of Cadillac rivals Aston Martin, but believes he has identified a weak spot that could reduce some of the gains at future weekends. 

Aston Martin brought its long-awaited major upgrade to the Hungaroring, with the 16-part package seeing changes to every visible surface. 

With the team showing improved pace across the early stages of the weekend, Fernando Alonso was then able to escape the first phase of qualifying for the first time this year, marking a key milestone for the British marque. 

Despite this improvement, Bottas views the gains with a certain level of scepticism. 

"It's pretty clear they made a big step with the car, especially in sector two where all the corners are - they are really strong," said the Finn. 

"I think against them, this is probably one of their better tracks. I still think on tracks with longer straights, they might be in trouble. But at least here, the case is now that we are at the back, but not by a big margin. This time it's Williams that is really close to us."

In response to Bottas' comments, Aston Martin would likely point to the fact that this is only phase one of the upgrade package, with a new Honda power unit expected to debut at the Dutch Grand Prix, immediately following the summer break. 

Asked if he had expected Aston Martin to make the gains it has, Bottas added: "There were a lot of rumours. There were rumors of two seconds faster and stuff like that, which I don't think is far off what they've done. 

"So they've clearly done a good job, but we've got to focus on ourselves and improving our package."

Bottas will start from 21st on the grid, ahead only of Cadillac team-mate Sergio Perez. 

"We started FP2 with quite a tricky balance, but by the end of Friday, we got into a good place, and actually it was more like fine-tuning from there," he said. 

"With certain things, we're a little bit boxed in with the setup, the way the car is behaving."