Antonelli yet to draw conclusions about rivals after Ferrari set the pace in Monaco

"It's pretty good fun with the F1 [car] around here. It's tricky, definitely to find the right balance and strike the maximum out of the tyre," the young Mercedes driver began after the second free practice session.

After finishing in P11 in FP1, the Italian set the ninth fastest time on Friday afternoon.

"I think today we've been trying a lot of different things, especially with the soft, especially in terms of warm-up, because it's really hard to extract the grip, especially in the lap one. But overall, I think I learned a lot during the day and I'm looking forward to tomorrow," he continued.

In both of Friday's sessions, Charles Leclerc set the fastest lap time in Monte-Carlo. Oscar Piastri finished marginally behind in second place, while Lewis Hamilton finished third in FP2.

Looking ahead to the rest of the weekend, Antonelli said: "We know Ferrari is always very strong here and McLaren has been strong the whole season, but you never know what fuel load the other are using or in terms of power. But we're just trying to focus on ourselves, trying to focus on myself, trying to improve every session in order to be ready for tomorrow."