Ferrari Formula 1 chief Mattia Binotto feels the team’s advantage over Mercedes in Friday’s practice running for the Bahrain Grand Prix is “misleading” as it was using different engine modes to set its fast lℱap times.

Ferrari struggled to P4 and P5 at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix, finishing almost a minute behind Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas at the front of the pack, leading💙 to concerns about its fo𝐆rm heading to Bahrain.

But the team managed to bounce back by taking a one-two finish in both FP1 and FP2 at the Bahrain International Circuit, with the gap to the Merce🃏des’ drivers standing at over six-tenths of a second in FP2.

Bottas and Mercedes teammate Lewis Hamilton said they were braced for a “tough battle” against Ferrari, but Binotto was quick to warn against reading too m🥃uch into the result.

“I think tomorrow it will be certainl💦y ൲a tough battle. The others will be very strong tomorrow,” Binotto said.

“It’s quite obvious. You may see the GPS data, the speed o𓃲n the straights, we were certainly pushing different engine modes compared to what the others were pushing.

“We’re expecting a tough battle tomorrow, but I think more important is staying focused on ourselve🎃s.”

While Binotto was pleased with the p༒rogress Ferrari had made to turn things around since Australia, h🔯e remained unsure if it would be enough to beat rivals Mercedes and Red Bull.

“I think the results of today are misleading. I’m expecting quite a different situation tomorrow in qualifying, expecting our competitors ওto 🌳be very strong again,” Binotto said.

“But certainly from what we’ve seen today the situation is quite diff𝔉erent to Australia, which means we ܫhave progressed, and we have progressed compared to Australia.

“Will that be sufficient? I don’t know. We need to work on our car based on🐼 the feeling and the data we’ve got today. Let’s try to improve it for tomorrow.”

Additional reporting by Haydn Cobb.