Mercedes drivers hugely happy with updates: 'Super grateful'

Hamilton drove with the updates and the feeling was good. "Everything went to plan today. I'm super grateful to everyone back at the factory for working so hard and bringing us upgrades for this weekend. It's been an incredibly tough year for us, and the team has continuously been pushing. Everyone kept their heads down and it feels like we are progressing with the car's performance," said the seven-time world champion.

As for everyone else, the second practice session was not very meaningful for Hamilton, as testing with next year's tyres took place. In any case, the feeling in VT1 was good and on that basis Mercedes will work on the set-up for qualifying and the race. "We will hopefully make some changes tonight and we'll find out tomorrow, where exactly we stand - but it doesn't feel like we're too far off."

Teammate George Russell is also pleased with the improvements made to the W13. "The upgrades we've brought to the car felt okay so far. FP1 was an odd session today, with some teams looking unexpectedly fast and some other teams that weren't as quick as we expected them to be. With the different FP2 format we don't know yet, what the packing order will be but so far our car is feeling quite strong, which is promising," he concludes.