More to come for Mercedes

In an ominous statement of intent for the remainder of the grid, Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton believes there is more to come from his Mercedes in Australia.

The 2008 Formula One World Champion, alongside team-mate Nico Rosberg completed 4,732km of mileage over three winter test sessions in Spain and Bahrain.

Mercedes achieved the most running of all the teams, a total which was actually more than that of Red Bull Racing, Lotus and Marussia combined.

Of that 4,732km, Hamilton completed 2,054km, whilst Rosberg completed more miles than any driver in the paddock with a finished total of 2,679km.

But it wasn’t just the mileage that Mercedes completed, it was also the lap times which they were setting.

Felipe Massa might have set the fastest time of the test for Williams with a 1minute 33.258seconds on third day of the final test session.

Hamilton and Rosberg were both just two one-hundredths off the Brazilian’s time.

Once it was confirmed by Pirelli that Massa’s time was set on the new super-soft tyre compound, whilst Hamilton’s was set on used soft’s and Rosberg on new soft’s, Mercedes dominance was confirmed.

When you look at the times set by Ferrari and McLaren, being a second off the pace whilst also on super-soft’s not only can you see the difference in performance from Mercedes to Ferrari, but also the great job Williams have done ahead of the new season.

‘There’s a lot more to come,’

‘I did two runs on the supersofts – the first run was not very good, part of the lap was okay but there were a few mistakes, and then the second run was terrible. But that’s just part and parcel of trying to learn how to extract the most from those tyres and now that I know there’s a whole heap more grip to come from those tyres I’ll set up the car better to extract it.’ Hamilton told Sky Sports.