Lewis Hamilton says he is hopeful that Ferrari can match his rivals as the Belgian Grand Prix weekend proceeds “more than expected” despite conceding the Italian team’s deficit in Friday practice.
Hamilton was close to the pace in first practice as he finished a tenth behind Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, but he was seventh behind Mercedes’ Cammy Antonelli as the world championship leader topped the second session.
Antonelli leads his Mercedes team-mate George Russell at the top of the standings with 25 points, while Hamilton is third with seven points as he seeks a record eighth F1 title.
Hamilton, who has been in fine form with four podiums in his last five races, can at least take the consolation of finishing ahead of team-mate Charles Leclerc in both sessions.
Hamilton said, “It was a very good day overall: positive, paced, and a relatively clean session.”
“We’ve made some changes in P2. The gap seems a bit bigger today, at least in P2, than expected but hopefully we can try to close it tomorrow.
“But overall I generally feel good.”
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Britt highlighted the middle sector as the part of the track where Ferrari needed to focus on finding more speed.
“The others look really strong,” Hamilton added. “Red Bull look really strong. Mercedes got a lot of pace in the (second) session. McLaren looked good too.
“So, I don’t really know. Like I said, the car feels pretty decent but we’re lacking a little bit in the mid-range for some reason.
“So, we’re just looking to find out why that is and see if we can pick it up tomorrow.”
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Despite going fastest in FP2, Kimi Antonelli still says Mercedes has work to do before qualifying.
Verstappen is ‘not sure’ how much speed the car has.
Verstappen came flying out of the blocks on Friday when he topped the first practice but had to settle for third in the second practice and was almost half a second off the pace.
Red Bull are no longer running their rotating ‘Macarina’ rear wing after two crashes for Verstappen in Austria and Silverstone but it appears to have had little effect on their pace.
Verstappen says there was a direct balance and suggests Red Bull are close to maximising their package at Spa-Francorchamps.
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Max Verstappen brought out the red flag during the second practice session at the Belgian GP after travelling through gravel.
“We just focus on ourselves. Honestly, I can’t be disappointed. It’s been a good day for us,” he said.
“I’m not sure how much more there is than the others but sense-wise it’s been OK. In second practice, you’ll see more of what the real difference is, but hopefully we can get a little bit out of that towards qualifying.
Norris: We might be closer than Silverstone.
Norris was Antonelli’s closest challenger at 0.190s off the pace but has a 10-grid-place penalty for Sunday’s Belgian Grand Prix due to new control electronics that exceed the season’s permitted limit.
Likewise for Verstappen, Norris was satisfied with his Friday but warned that McLaren had been strong in second practice recently, only to fall back in qualifying.
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Lando Norris has reacted to the news that he will take a 10-place grid penalty for exceeding the power unit factor limit at the Belgian Grand Prix.
“We haven’t changed anything this weekend, so we expect nothing different,” said the reigning world champion.
“The Red Bulls don’t usually come on a Friday so we’ll arrive tomorrow and they’ll be just as fast, if not faster, so let’s wait and see.
“Maybe we changed it with Mercedes and the others didn’t so we’re still probably fourth fastest. But if we can fix things, we can be a bit closer than Silverstone.”
Sky Sports F1 Belgian GP schedule
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Look back at some of the year’s most dramatic moments at the Belgian Grand Prix.
Saturday 18 July
9am: F3 sprint
11.15am: Belgium GP Practice Three (Session starts at 11.30am)
1.15pm: F2 sprint
2.15pm: Belgium GP Qualifying Build-up*
3pm: Belgian GP Qualifying*
Sunday, July 19
7.30am: F3 Feature Race
9am: F2 Feature Race
10.45am: Porsche Super Cup
12.30pm: Belgium GP build-up: Grand Prix Sunday
2pm: Belgian Grand Prix
4pm: Belgian GP reaction: checkered flag
