Mercedes in Qatar: "There's a bit of work to get Hamilton happy"

Valtteri Bottas beat Lewis Hamilton on the first day in the Qatar Grand Prix weekend. The Finnish teammate finished top of the timesheets in the second free practice session. Mercedes trackside engineer notes that Hamilton wasn't entirely happy with set-up but remains confident. 

Bottas fastest

Hamilton was beaten by Bottas and Verstappen. Mercedes know they've got some work to do overnight on the circuit that is new to Formula 1. 

"The whole day has been about learning on this new circuit. You do a lot of simulation work and the big question is does it match? The car is working well, comes in about where we expected. A strong day from Valtteri overall we're pretty pleased with it," Shovlin told Sky Sports. 

"Today, Valtteri looked like the man out there. Quick on the single lap, very good on the long run. If the car is working well, we'll get the car working well with Lewis. It's been an encouraging day. There's a bit of work to get Lewis happy, Red Bull will be working on their own problems overnight. So we've got to work on keeping whatever advantage we've got."

Track limits

In a fresh debate with the FIA, Bottas exceeded track limits and had his fastest time of the session removed from the timesheets when he ran wide. Shovlin explained what happened here. 

"They removed the track limits when they were defined as the white line. There remains a limit that you've got to have the wheel on the purple and white lien so there was a bit of confusion getting that across to Valtteri before the session," Shovlin said.