Lewis Hamilton believes that although Ferrari were “a little lacking” during free practice ahead of the Belgian Grand Prix, they will be able to make the right changes and close the gap to their rivals overnight.
The team found its feet early in the day, with Hamilton finishing second in Free Practice 1, finishing 0.145 seconds behind Max Verstappen’s benchmark, while Charles Leclerc’s second Ferrari secured third place.
However, in the later session the Scuderia fell behind the Mercedes, Red Bull and McLaren drivers, with Hamilton finishing fourth. Leclerc struggled significantly more, failing to make the top ten after his fastest lap on soft tires was ruled out.
However, Hamilton was pleased with their overall performance and said: “Overall a pretty good day. Positively, we took steps forward, relatively clean sessions.
“We’ve made a couple of changes to FP2. The gap seems a little bigger today, at least 2 FP, than expected, but hopefully we can try to close it tomorrow. Overall, we’re feeling good overall.”
But with more than seven-tenths separating him from Kimi Antonelli in the second FP, the Briton admitted the Scuderia had a lot to adjust overnight to give their rivals a fight in Saturday’s qualifying session.
“The others look very strong,” Hamilton continued. “Obviously Red Bull looks very strong. Mercedes picked up the pace a lot in the sessions. McLaren looked good too, so I really don’t know.
“Like I said, the car feels pretty decent, but for some reason we’re missing a little bit in the middle section. We’ll just figure out why that is and see if we can fix it tomorrow. I love driving at this track, it’s amazing.”
Having won two of the last three grands prix, team principal Fred Vasser appeared keen to accept that Friday’s results would not necessarily be replicated in qualifying, leaving the door open for Ferrari to challenge for a place at the front again.
“We know that fuel is very important from a competitive point of view – this means that we cannot compare with others,” Vasseur explained. “We’re concentrating on ourselves, trying to get the best out of what we’ve got, and we’ll see tomorrow afternoon.
“If you look at the last four or five rounds, Friday’s classification is not entirely representative. We have a lot of work to do.”