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Valtteri Bottas shared that his nude calendar raised over $150,000 for Movember charity.
The calendar, featuring the Finnish F1 driver in different naked poses, sold over 10,000 copies. The project was created in partnership with Movember, an annual event that raises awareness regarding men's health, especially cancer and mental health.
Bottas took to social media to thank everyone for supporting the cause by purchasing the calendar.
"Thank you so much for all the support in November," he wrote on Instagram. "With the donations and with the calendars we have together raised a substantial amount for Movember - meaning WE have really helped and will affect and save many people's lives. Final figures to be calculated in the next days, but we are talking around $150k of funds raised!"
Valtteri Bottas reveals the story behind the naked calendar idea
Earlier last year, Bottas had posted a picture on his Instagram of him lying down naked in a stream in Aspen. The picture gained enough traction on social media for him and photographer Paul Ripke to come up with the idea of doing a full series of similar photos for charity.
"Last year, when I launched that one photo in Aspen, it was quite popular," Bottas told Motorsport. "And we actually did raise quite a bit of funds. Because I do quite a bit of stuff with Ripke, he's a good friend, the photographer, and then we started to joke about the idea, 'Imagine, if there's the full calendar.'"
The Finn felt that Movember would be a good cause to raise money for since men's mental health was a good cause.
"And then closer to November, Movember month, we started to think actually, that's something we could do, something really, really good. "And we decided that yeah, let's do it, but for charity. It's mainly for prostate cancer research, so I think it's for a good cause."
Valtteri Bottas is looking forward to a better season in 2024 with Sauber after the disappointing stint he had with the team this year. He and his teammate Guanyu Zhou scored 16 points throughout 2023, narrowly getting ahead of Haas to take ninth place in the constructors' standings. Interestingly, Alfa Romeo will change its name for the upcoming season after its current title sponsorship came to an end. The team is expected to change its name to the Sauber brand for 2024, before its transformation into the Audi works team in 2026.
