Valtteri Bottas admits he was ‘slightly surprised’ Mercedes was so far ahead of its competitors in Friday prac💦tice for the Italian Grand Prix.

Mercedes ended both practice sessions firsᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚt and second with Bottas ♐topping the first session, while Hamilton had the advantage in the afternoon.

Lando Norris was best o🤡f the rest for McLaren, finishing FP2 nearly 0.9s off the pace set🗹 by Hamilton.

Reflecting on his 𝓀day’s work, Bottas was surprised by how big the advantage Mercedes has over the other teams.

“It felt pretty good all through the day, but I’m sure we ﷺcan still improve it,” Bottas said. “I would say the biggest for me was lacking rear stability in a few corners, but other than that it was pretty good. Actually, I think the performance and the lap times compared to the others is slightlyജ surprising at this point, but, of course, we’ll see it tomorrow.”

After trailing Hamilton by just over 0.2s in second pract෴ice, Bottas is confident he can find the gains necessary to take his first career pole at Monz🉐a on Saturday.

“There is always more to come, for sure, Bottas added. “I think my lap in FP2 wasn’t that great, so a🌄lso from my side there’s quite a bit more to come. I’m surཧe it’s the same thing for every team.”

The Finn believe🐠s there won't be as much tyre management as there was in last weekend's Belgian Grand Prix due to the lack of high-speed, high load c🌜orners.

“It’s a bit lessܫ here. It’s a completely different type of track, it’s really stop and go, there’s really no high-speed corners as such, so you need to manage traction, you don’t want to over-slip the tyres, but other than that, there’s less management.”