Lewis Hamilton reveals Mercedes worry and team-mate Valtteri Bottas agrees
LEWIS HAMILTON and Valtteri Bottas have both admitted Mercedes need to make improvements if they are to keep tabs on their rivals this season.
Mercedes were the third quickest team throughout the first week of qualifying in Barcelona.
Ferrari came out on top through Sebastian Vettel and Charles Leclerc while Red Bull were a close second.
The Silver Arrows know where the issues are but Hamilton remained coy on the details.
“I won’t say! I don’t want the others to know what we do and don’t need,” the Brit admitted.
However, Hamilton did acknowledge that his side have some work to do before the season kicks off in Australia on March 17.
“At the moment we are behind,” Hamilton added.
“So, we don’t approach the first race currently at all relaxed, not that we ever do. We still have a lot of work to do.
“This is going to be the hardest year yet, but I feel I have the best group of people behind to climb that mountain together.
“We are going to face our toughest challenge but I feel like I have the right soldiers behind me.”
Hamilton’s team-mate Bottas also acknowledged the issues his side face.
“We have work to do, but it’s a good feeling in the sense that it feels like there is potential,” Bottas said.
“We do need to make improvements.
“We were struggling a bit over the week to find a good balance for all the corners.
“There were some corners that were good, some corners we would have balance issues and other corners we would have massive balance issues.
“We were getting to a much better state at the end of the week, but some of the handling issues can only be sorted with some upgrades.
“We’re hoping to fix those hopefully soon.”