BARCELONA, Spain -- As pre-season testing entered its second week at the Circuit de Catalunya on Tuesday, Lewis Hamilton earmarked Ferrari as the team to beat this year.
A lap set by Hamilton's Mercedes teammate Valtteri Bottas in the first week of testing remains the fastest time at the circuit so far this year, but Ferrari's consistent pace on the soft tyre has also turned heads. Combined with strong reliability since the start of testing, Hamilton believes Ferrari has emerged as the team to beat this year.
"I think Ferrari are possibly the favourites," he said. "We can't take our eyes off them. They've done such a good job at the moment and Red Bull look like they've gone quite quick as well today. So we shall see over the next days and most importantly in the next weeks. I think it's going to be close at the first race, that's for sure."
Mercedes has completed the most mileage of any team, but Hamilton said there was still plenty of performance to be found from the new W08.
"We're on target in terms of the laps that we've done, the target in terms of how much mileage we're going to get, but of course with performance we are always searching for more. I'm just throwing a number maybe but I would say we are at 70, 80 per cent maybe. But I hope that we pull out the rest in time for the first race."
Hamilton completed the morning session in the car on Tuesday but said damage to the floor meant his running was cut short.
"It didn't feel that spectacular this morning but there were just some issues we had with tyre temps and with some damage to the floor. That's why I sacrificed a bit of my morning to make sure the car was fixed in time for Valtteri this afternoon."