Lewis Hamilton is seeing the increased pressure to perform in his title fight with Sebastian Vettel as a positive, believing it leads people to do "extraordinary things".

The reigning world champion holds a 24-point lead in the standings heading into the final nine races of the season, however, the general consensus is that his Mercedes is inferior to the Ferrari driven by Vettel in terms of performance.

As a result, it is upto the Briton to try and make up that gap through his own sheer talent and while most would likely crack in that situation, Hamilton insists he thrives.

"I can't tell you how Sebastian feels with the pressure, I can only tell you the pressure on me. It's as great as it can be," he said at Spa on Thursday.

"But I wouldn't want it any other way. As humans, pressure leads us to try to do extraordinary things, to evolve, to push the envelope, to be better in all areas."

Luck has very much been on the Mercedes driver's side in recent races with the weather intervening at both Hockenheim and the Hungaroring to help him score unlikely wins at the expense of his main rival.

Looking forward, the 33-year-old knows a crucial few weeks lay in store as the season ebbs and flows.

"We have had two great results which have been fortunate for us," he said. "I look at these next two high-speed circuits [Spa and Monza] and we need to hammer hard to come away with great points before Singapore, where we struggle.

"I don't know how we are going to fare around some of those other circuits and these two I feel like we have a better chance compared to the last two races and we need to make sure we deliver what we did the last race and capitalise on the positives."

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After practice in Belgium on Friday though, it does appear the Scuderia is the team to beat but Hamilton was comfortable with where Mercedes stood as he finished second within two-tenths of pacesetter Kimi Raikkonen.

“It’s really close between us and Ferrari; it seems like we’ve both been bringing new updates at a similar rate," he commented.

"For the middle sector, you want to have a good amount of downforce, but you want less in the other sectors to gain speed down the straights. The challenge is to find the right balance and thankfully I have a great team working on that.”