When Mercedes expect to close in on Red Bull and Ferrari

Mercedes engineer James Vowles says he is "fairly sure" the team will soon start to close in on Ferrari and Red Bull at the front of the Formula 1 grid - but not until the Canadian Grand Prix weekend is behind them. Lewis Hamilton and George Russell are expected to remain in "no man's land" in Montreal, say Mercedes, at yet another bumpy City circuit. The team's bouncing problems are persisting, despite having made a big step forward during the Spanish Grand Prix with Hamilton matching the pace of the front-runners during large periods of the race. "We didn’t expect perhaps to drop back as much as we did in Baku but that provided a platform to learn from," Vowles said, as he forecast another challenging weekend in Canada. "Montreal isn’t going to be substantially different to the last two races, I think we will still have a package that isn’t at the front on merit. "Red Bull and Ferrari will still be the benchmark that we have to compare ourselves to," he admitted.

Vowles 'fairly sure' progress will follow Montreal race

But there are positives coming for Mercedes who believe that, once Montreal is behind them, they will start to find the small development steps that will return them to the front. It comes after Hamilton set his team the target of challenging for their first race win of the season during the British Grand Prix weekend. The seven-time World Champion is the only driver in the history of the sport to have won a race in every season he has competed it - but he is yet to win in 2022. Vowles continued: "I think that the large gap that you saw in qualifying in Baku perhaps won’t be that big in Montreal, it will be back down from where it was [before]. "As we go through all the races from then onwards, I am fairly sure we will find small steps and developments that push us back towards the front.”