Hamilton has “work to do” with Mercedes

Lewis Hamilton concedes both he and Mercedes have “got work to do with the balance” of his Formula 1 car after losing out to teammate Valtteri Bottas in Friday practice at the Spanish Grand Prix.

The reigning F1 world champion trailed the Finn throughout both practice sessions at Circuit de Catalunya but appeared to close the gap at the end of FP2 as he claimed second place on the times just 0.049s off fastest driver Bottas.

Hamilton says the windy conditions initially made it tricky to find a comfortable feeling with his Mercedes W10 F1 car but is confident with data analysis and setup tweaks overnight he can gain momentum heading into qualifying and the race at the Spanish GP.

“It was quite windy on track today and it was a bit tricky with the grip levels on the three different tyres, but we got through our programme and now have lots of data to analyse tonight and then fine tune the car for tomorrow,” Hamilton said. “Everyone worked really hard to bring the new package here and a huge amount of effort has gone into it.

“It seems like it’s working, but it’s hard to feel it because this track is so different to the streets of Baku. We’ve got work to do with the balance, but it’s been positive for us to be out there.”

Mercedes trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin has echoed Hamilton’s comments comparing the team’s two drivers but feels the team can get on top of its setup issues to help the British driver.

“It’s no secret that we weren’t very strong at the tests here in winter so we’re happy to have shown reasonable pace on short and long runs today,” Shovlin said.

“Valtteri has found the car a bit easier to work with today than Lewis but on both, there’s a few corners where it isn’t as together as we’d like and it’s making it a bit of a handful at time.”