Valtteri Bottas wants to start negotiations over a new 🅠Formula 1 contract with Mercedes as earlꦑy as possible in 2020 to avoid “unnecessary talk” about his future.

The Finn, who enjoyed his best-ever F1 season in 2019 as he claimed runner-up sp♌ot behind teammate and champion Lℱewis Hamilton, is out of contract with Mercedes at the end of the year.

Bottas has been on rolling one-year deals since he joined Mercedes in 2017 and has had h🙈is future resolved no earlier than July in the past three seasons, with his 2020 contract not being announced until late August last year.

“It’s no secret that my contract ends [a🌜t th🦩e] end of this season,” Bottas said.

“So naturally you want to start talking quite a bit early on but at the same time, at this time of the year there’s no point🃏 as it’s too early and we are pretty busy focusing on performance.

“But we have a good relationship with Toto [Wolff] and everyone in the team, so when it’s time, we wi𒉰ll talk about things openly.

“For sᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚure I learned things and the team also said they learned about how we handled things [the 2019 talks] last year and how we communicated it.

“I’m sure it can be done a bit smoother and with less things happeniꦬng around [it𒉰] - less headlines. But like I said it’s early days.”

Bottas admitted he found his drawn-out contract talks of previous years to be “a distraction” thꦗat hindered his performance.

“There was a bit 🅠too much unnecessary talk outside the team,” he explained.

“Everything should have just been kept internal. I think it makes things easier. And for sure we learnt that when the decisions w𝕴ere made last year it was always better being earlier.

“If you have to drag 🌺it on for August, September, it kind of builds up and becomes more of a distraction but if things were done a couple of months earlier then it makes it much more simple because all of the speculation ramps up towards August and🌼 September.”

And Bottas believes it “helps a l๊ot” to be tied down to a long-term contract, describing it as a “win-win situation” for both team and driver.

“If you know [what you're doing] f💜or many years ahead and obviously if you're comfortable in the team, it's only a win-win situation,” he said.

“If the team wants you long-term, if the driver is happy to be there, you kn🌳ow what's happening in the future, so you can concentrate on the work and on the future... There's no need for the team to hide a🔥nything from the driver.

“So it's always a good thing if it'ꦓs long-term, I believe, but it doesn't a🔯lways happen in Formula 1, as I've seen.

“It's a political sport and there's many drivers wanting to get seats, and many teams want to ꦛkeep options open for different reasons, and ෴that's how it goes.”