Optimism was back at Mercedes after a "better" Friday at the Dutch Grand Prix.

Starting with a one-two in the first session, Lewis Hamilton was then second fastest in Practice 2 at Zandvoort, less than a tenth behind the pacesetting Ferraris.

And the seven-time world champion was buoyed to see a return to the type of performance Mercedes was showing before the summer break in Hungary.

"It's a lot better than Friday last week," Hamilton said referring to Spa. "It's been a decent start to the weekend, we have landed in a much sweeter spot with the car on a different track and it's a work in progress.

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"We are not that far behind which is great to see and the car does not feel that bad. So, we just have to keep chipping away.

"There is probably not much more performance wise but we will keep pushing."

Teammate George Russell was also in the mix in P5 but believes Mercedes' hopes depend on how they perform in qualifying.

"Better than Spa that is for sure!" Russell declared summarising his Friday. "The car is working better, there is no doubt about it.

"It's going to be close, McLaren are looking close and Aston Martin.

"We know qualifying is still our weak point. The race will come towards us.

"I think our long run pace is strong, but you have to start in the right position. It will be difficult to battle for P1 and P2."

Speaking on Thursday, the Briton also admitted Mercedes still need to understand why the W13 is such a better race car than over a single lap.

“It’s definitely been a bit of a theme for us this season,” he said.

“We’re still yet to fully understand why we have such a big swing, to be honest.

“The swing is probably less compared to Red Bull. But, when you look at it compared to the midfield, we’re often being out-qualified by an Alpine or a McLaren and even Alex [Albon, Williams] was very close to out-qualifying us last week.

“But then, in the race, we showed some really strong pace. We just need to overcome our single-lap struggles.”