Hamilton laughs off speculation about Vettel Mercedes move

Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen went fastest in first practice for the Belgian Grand Prix on Friday, edging out Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes.

Refreshed from an August break in the Caribbean, including a trip to Cuba in his role as UNICEF ambassador, the Mercedes driver is 14 points behind championship leader Sebastian Vettel as he revs up for the second half of the season.

Red Bull also ran the purple-marked compound and although fourth and fifth, the RB13 was 0.8s adrift of Raikkonen around the fast, sweeping Spa-Francorchamps circuit.

Hamilton’s team-mate Valtteri Bottas was sixth after an off-track moment. But Raikkonen – a four-time victor of the Belgian Grand Prix – said he hadn’t noticed much change.

As Bottas slowly got his Mercedes out of trouble and back to the pits, Hamilton stayed out on the same set of tyres and pumped in a 1m45.555s to leap a second clear of Ricciardo.

Speculations started earlier this year that Vettel, who still hasn’t signed a contract extension with Ferrari, could move out of his team at the end of the year. The damage was significant and leaves Williams needing to change the chassis, which the team admits means it is “a long shot” that it will be able to fix the auto in time to run during FP2.

Cape Town – Mercedes boss Toto Wolff is wary of the favourites’ tag being put on the Silver Arrows ahead of the Belgian Grand Prix.

“You don’t want your competitors to see if you are struggling mentally or physically, you don’t ever want to show weakness”, he said. “We’ll let them do their talking outside while we’re here to deliver some very special performances”, Hamilton said. It’s clear that there are certain tracks where the characteristics of the circuit suits our vehicle better or theirs works better. So I don’t believe any of the bosses are unhappy with what is now in place.

“But then it was more hard than the results look like, because we had some pretty close racing with Ferrari – Barcelona with Sebastian [Vettel] being really close behind Lewis, and then Sochi and Spielberg, being really close behind Valtteri”.

“I’m glad that we at least got a few laps in with high fuel”.

“I am not entirely happy but overall I think the vehicle is okay”, he said. I think we have only to gain.

There is rain in the forecast, which might yet give us an outcome no one is expecting.