Hamilton excited by close gap between top three

Lewis Hamilton is excited by the gap between the top three teams in Melbourne following the conclusion of the first day of practice. The 2018 Formula 1 season kicked off at Albert Park on Friday, with Hamilton setting the pace in both practice sessions.

After the morning session, the Briton held a huge advantage over the rest of the field. However, the timesheet told a different story at the end of second practice, with less than three-tenths separating Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull. 

Hamilton enters the season in search of a fifth world title, as is rival Sebastian Vettel. The 33-year-old was happy with the pace of his Mercedes after the first day of running, and claims that it will be a challenge for him to extract more performance from the car.

"Coming to the first race, you really have no idea what it's going to be like. You don't how you're going to feel physically, you don't know how the tyres are going to react to the circuit. But we started on the right foot today, we got through everything we needed. It closed up a little bit in FP2 in terms of the gap between us all, but that's exciting.

"It's more challenging for me to try and eke out a little more from the car. It's been such a nice day, Albert Park is a really beautiful place to be and work when the weather is like this. The tyres definitely didn't seem to have the same issue that we had in Barcelona where they were blistering, so it felt a lot more normal.

"Obviously the car is quicker here than it was last year, so it feels better everywhere. Turns 11 and 12 are crazy, we're not even braking into that corner, it's insane. It's going to rain tomorrow and on Sunday as far as I'm aware. I've not driven in the rain yet on these tyres, so that'll be interesting."

Fergal Walsh