Max Verstappen of Red Bull was fastest in qualifying for the season's first race in Bahrain, but Hamilton won the race. It will take "anything and more" to top Red Bull at Imola, according to the world champion.

Hamilton, on the other hand, was encouraged by Mercedes' obvious success on the first day of the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix.

Hamilton comments, “The team definitely worked really hard to try to understand what happened in the last race where we were weak and see if we can try to tweak the car a little bit better with set-up,” he said. “But I think the track has also come a little bit more in our direction.

He continues, “We started off with a really good set-up, and just small tweaks here and there, but nothing major, no major issues. So far, good pace for us.”

The cooler temperatures in Italy may have also helped Mercedes, according to Hamilton: “It’s way better. When it’s this cool, I mean it’s obviously a nice day, but the last place we were at obviously in Bahrain it’s so warm so when you go out, already the temperatures are going up.

He adds, “The [tyres] are overheating throughout from entry to middle to the exit of each corner. That’s why here you’re kind of in a nice, sweet spot in temperature, so it’s not so bad.”

Between the two practice sessions, the track conditions improved, with only one help race session taking place in between to add more rubber to the track surface.

He comments, “It’s quite bumpy here, but good grip, and the tyres are working really well here.”

After Friday's practice, Mercedes has a 0.85-second lead over the fastest Red Bull. However, Hamilton is skeptical, as Verstappen was forced to withdraw from the race due to a suspected driveshaft issue during the second practice session.

To conclude, “I don’t think we’ve seen the best from the Red Bulls yet, they look like they’ve had quite messy sessions with traffic and that. So it will be interesting to see tomorrow just how quick they are.”