Mercedes: 'We don't really know how we compare to Red Bull and Ferrari'

"Firstly, Nyck did a great job for us in the morning session. Considering how little time he's had in the car, it was impressive how quick and consistent he was. We used the session to get through a test programme varying the car specification each run and we've acquired some useful learning on the back of it," Shovlin told his employer's press release.

Russell's focus in the first free practice session was mainly on testing a number of new parts. "He wasn't particularly happy with the balance of the car but managed to get it closer to his liking in the afternoon," he said." For Hamilton, he had even less time to get used to the W13 at Paul Ricard. "Lewis had his work cut out trying to recover the lost time - he wasn't particularly happy with where the car was and we need to work on that overnight."

Gap to Red Bull and Ferrari

Still, Mercedes is confident it can score a reasonably good starting position for Sunday's race. "We've got a pretty good idea of where we want to go on setup. For one reason and another, we didn't get as much work done on high fuel as we'd have liked so we don't really know how we compare to Red Bull and Ferrari but we do at least look closer to them than to the midfield." Advantageously for Mercedes, Sainz is out due to a grid penalty. So the second row on the grid is very realistic.

Ahead of the weekend in France, the Brackley-based team might have hoped for a win, but that thought can be scrapped. Shovlin: "We're not expecting to be on their pace tomorrow, both those teams looks like they are very strong on a single lap, especially Ferrari but hopefully we can get a bit closer in the race on Sunday."