Lewis Hamilton says Mercedes enjoyed one of its most positive days of Formula 1 pre-season testing yet as i𒆙t continues to evaluate its latest aerodynamic upgrade. 

The reigning world champions introduced a revised aero package for the second week of winter testing in Barcelona 🥃i🔜n a renewed push for added performance amid its own suggestion that Ferrari is currently the team to beat heading into the 2019 season. 

Mercedes has been working hard to understand its new aero concept and the early signs point towꦕards a step forward, a🎐ccording to five-time world champion Hamilton. 

“Today has been a g𝔉ood da꧋y - lots of mileage, which is great for us” said Hamilton. 

“It has prob🤡ably been one of the most positive days for us, we've really learned quite a lot. 

“We've been able to apply our learnings from the morning to ♈the afternoon, so I'm looking forwaꦫrd to seeing how Valtteri felt, but the car looked like it was in a better place. 

“Our understanding of the W10 is continuously growing so it𒐪 was definitely a positive day.” 

Bottas rackꦅed up 97 laps in the afternoon to take Mercedes’ collective pre-season lap count past the 1000-mark as the German manufacturer continued to set 🅰the benchmark in terms of mileage. 

“We got a lo𒊎t of laps in today which is always g🦂ood,” Bottas explained. 

“I did a race simulation which was interrupted by the red flag, but it confᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚirmed the progress we've made since last week. 

“We're getting more and more prepared for Melbourne, but there's room for improvement and still a few question marks on where we stand compared to the competꦡition. 

“We're focusing on oꦆur performance; the entire team i🅰s pushing really hard and keeps improving the car and that's all that matters. 

“We need to maximise the last day🔯 of testing as it will be our final chance to try out a few things ahead of Melbourne.” 

Technical director James Allison said Mercedes was able to make progress with the front-graining issues it encountered over a race distance earlier in testing, and revealed the team is set to finally focus on some 💛performance runs on Friday. 

“Today w🥀as a very productive day, either side of a trouble-f🎐ree race distance we did a lot of good investigative work and in the race simulation itself,” he said. 

“Unlike yesterday, where we failed to make the tyres live, we had good tyre behaviour across all three stints. We look forward to tomorrow where we will be investigating the range of tyr✅e compounds and focusing more on single lap pace.”