Hamilton highlights ‘night and day’ difference between Ferrari and Mercedes

When the red flag dropped with around ten laps to go in Monte Carlo, Hamilton was handed an opportunity to take victory from Antonelli. "I was thinking about winning. I was thinking about getting him at the beginning. No, that was an opportunity, but unfortunately, we both basically got pretty much the same starts. I think I gained on him just a little bit and I was almost to his rear wheel, but not enough to pop me in the lead, unfortunately," the Briton said.

Antonelli once again managed to build a gap to the Ferrari driver. Hamilton also noted a clear difference between the two cars. "As we got going, I just got to see him pull away. The performance they have is next level. It was a good experience because it gives me a much better idea of where I need to have the team lean and improve, not only from what I’m feeling but what I’m seeing as well. And yeah, there’s lots of things that we need to be adding to this car."

Hamilton was then asked where exactly Ferrari needs to make the SF-26 better. He added: "Just general performance. Downforce-wise, clearly they’re above us. Obviously on power, here the power is not such an issue. It’s just downforce. You could see just on traction those guys were night and day different to us. But hopefully we’ve got some performance coming, and I know the guys are working really hard back at the factory, so I hope that they’re happy with this result."

Thanks to finishing second in Monaco for the second weekend in a row, the seven-time F1 world champion is now also sitting second in the drivers' standings. He is 66 points behind Antonelli, and two points ahead of George Russell, who did not score a single point in Monte Carlo on Sunday.

He added: "I can’t believe that I’m second in the championship and I’m really happy and thankful for that. I couldn’t have done that without this team, without the reliability that we have, and also with Fred. Fred has been awesome in supporting me. I think last year was really tough for both of us and [I’ve been] begging him for certain changes, and he pulled through and he did those, and now I’m seeing the fruits of that and I’m able to finally deliver for them. I think it’s still very early days in the season, so we just have to keep chasing.