Red Bull is looking in a better position with its latest upgrade package according to drivers Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo, with both believing they've gained ground on the Italian team.
Red Bull's start to the season has been a difficult one, with Ferrari and Mercedes leading out front on two wins apiece, whilst Red Bull have been fighting for 'best of the rest' behind.
However in Spain it looked as though their latest upgrades may have delivered a performance gain, with Verstappen just three-tenths shy of the leading Ferrari of Kimi Räikkönen.
"I think it looks like we have closed the gap a little bit to Ferrari so this is a big positive, but it looks like Mercedes have brought a good update package as well so they are still quite far ahead," commented the Dutch driver.
"We are still the third team but the changes are taking us in the right direction and we have found an increase in grip. We still have a lot of work to do to improve the pace of the car and also the performance of the engine so we will keep pushing."
Ricciardo too believes they've made progress, but doesn't believe it's enough to beat Ferrari yet, with further improvements to be made.
"There were times today where the car felt pretty good but at times we were still trying to find our way with the new package," he explained. "The car was starting to come alive on the soft tyre this afternoon which was nice, but with the harder compounds we still have some improvements to make.
"I do see a step forward and we aren’t looking too bad against Ferrari but I’m sure they will also have more to bring tomorrow.
"We need to keep evolving with this new package now and fully understand it. We didn’t come here expecting to be as quick as Mercedes but we are feeling a bit of progress and now we just need to keep fine tuning everything to get a few more tenths out of the car.
"I think we are in line with what we predicted and tomorrow we will have a much better idea about whether the gap to the leaders has been closed."
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