Hamilton says Mercedes are performing “much better” in Monaco this year

Lewis Hamilton says the first day of practice for the Monaco Grand Prix suggested Mercedes won’t suffer a repeat of their poor 2017 race.

Mercedes executive director Toto Wolff previously said he was “bloody worried” about their return to the circuit after last year’s race, where neither car finished on the podium and Hamilton qualified outside the top 10.

But Hamilton was encouraged by their practice performance on Thursday. “It’s been an OK day,” he said. “We didn’t suffer any damage which is a good thing.”

“I said yesterday the Red Bulls were going to be quick which they were today. As expected, we struggled a little bit more. The car felt good in some places, in others it felt bad.

“So we have got some things to work on, but we’re not completely in the dark. We’re in a much better place than we were last year. We’re closer to Red Bull and Ferrari than I expected, but we’re still a few tenths off.

“We’ve got some ground to cover and pick up if we want to be in the fight for the win. We’ve got to keep working on the set-up and try and see if we can pull out some more potential from the car.”

Hamilton added his first impression of the hyper-soft tyre was that it degraded more quickly than expected.

“The hyper-soft felt good but it doesn’t last very long,” he said. “It looks good for qualifying but could be interesting in the race.”

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