Like everyone else, Daniel Ricciardo, Sebastian Vettel and Valtteri Bottas are intrigued by just how the competitive order behind Mercedes will start to reveal itself at this weekend’s Australian GP
Although the defending champions have shown that they still have a clear edge on the chasing pack during pre-season testing, Red Bull, Ferrari and Williams are all fighting to be ‘best of the rest’.
Establishing a clear picture based on winter form is a notoriously tricky business, but things will become clearer as the weekend progresses in Melbourne.
“It looks pretty close in that group,” Ricciardo, who scored three wins for Red Bull in his debut season with the team, said on Thursday. “We’ll see what happens on track, but it does look like the Mercs have pace again this year. But for that last spot on the podium it looks pretty close between us Ferrari and Williams.
“I’m sure there’ll be a few other players coming into the mix. We’ll see everyone on track like-for-like this weekend. I think that’s going to be exciting; we’ve been asked so many questions – ‘Where do you think you stand?’ – but testing doesn’t really show everything.
“What it did show was that the Mercs are quick. But other than that it’s all pretty close behind them.”
Having left Red Bull to join Ferrari at the end of last season, Vettel is optimistic the Scuderia have made-up ground after a difficult 2014.
“Generally the atmosphere’s been very positive,” said the four-time champion. “Obviously there’s been a lot of change over the winter but people have been working very hard and we’ve definitely improved as a team.
“We’ll see when we get the chance to put the car on the track. We’ll see where the others are, we’ll see what the others run, especially on Saturday [qualifying].
“Winter is always a bit tricky to understand everything.”
Bottas arguably seemed the most confident of the trio, with the Finn hopeful that Williams might challenge Mercedes later in the season.
“It’s still really early days and testing is not always easy to see where you are,” he said. “But we know what everyone knows, that Mercedes is still ahead of everyone at this point.
“But it is a long season, there’s different types of tracks and you never know if there’s an opportunity.
“So we’ll keep pushing and see if that happens. I really hope so.”
McLaren, meanwhile, have struggled after renewing their partnership with Honda and Kevin Magnussen admitted that expectations for this weekend are “quite low”.
The Dane, who stands in for Fernando Alonso in Albert Park, admitted: “We’re struggling with reliability, making the car run for a long time.
“But also I think this is a new start for McLaren in many ways. It’s going to take time.”