Here is the translation from Valtteri Bottas thread
Courtesy Nicole:
Aarnio-Wihuri's old connections helped in the Bottas-deal
F1 | Turun Sanomat 4.12.2012 23:39
Valtteri Bottas F1-contract was announced in the end of November. Commercial Counsellor Antti Aarnio-Wihuri and Sir Frank Williams had however talked through the schemes already last summer.
– Frank and I met in August and basically agreed upon that this is what we aim for. In the end everything went just like we had planned. I had known for a longer time that Valtteri gets the seat as a racing driver. But we agreed that we will not talk about this and that's exactly how we acted, Aarnio-Wihuri said to Urheilutieto.
Aarnio-Wihuri has known Frank Williams for 30 years already. They met during Aarnio-Wihuri's own racing career.
As a young man he raced both in track-racing and rally and he also owned his own racing team in motorsport in the 70's.
It's quite a circle in Finnish motorsport that closes due to Bottas' F1-seat.
The times are completely different now, but the personal connections that Antti Aarnio-Wihuri made decades ago are still valid.
Motorsport is still close to his heart. His company Wihuri Oy has supported Bottas' rise to F1 for many years already.
– We made the plan about going for Valtteri's F1-seat ten years ago already, so of course it's a positive thing that it finally succeeded. It's never granted that these things pull off.
– What made his seat possible was that Valtteri knows how to race, but also the fact that we have invested a lot of money in him. In addition to that I have a personal relationship with Frank Williams. That was also significant, Aarnio-Wihuri says.
– Our big ads appear on Williams-team's car next year so that they are visible in television. On top of that we have different by-products that are related to the races and also bring visibility. We have factories in Europe and USA. We invest though F1-sponsoring to get visibility in the countries where we have operation, Aarnio-Wihuri said.
The company also put cold money in the game so that Bottas got the racing seat.
– We are talking about substantial amounts but not about tens of millions like some other drivers are said to bring in. We hope that we get back the money we invested through advertising.
– Other Finnish companies should start to sponsor young driver-talents but they should choose the target they sponsor very carefully. Everyone's driving talents and especially mental characteristics are not enough for a F1-seat. This project succeeded brilliantly because we proceeded with a long-term plan.
Other Finnish companies who sponsor Bottas are Kemppi and Laulumaa.
Turun Sanomat, Helsinki
TS-Urheilutieto
http://www.ts.fi/moottoriurheilu/f1/423 ... amspestiin
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