Lewis Hamilton believes Ferrari and Mercedes have made near identical progress with the updates they have brought to their cars at the Spanish Grand Prix.

Mercedes took the wraps off a major update in Barcelona this weekend, with a revised nose and floor as well as new power units on both cars. In second practice the gap stood at 0.3s to Kimi Raikkonen in the fastest Ferrari, but Hamilton thinks the reality will be much closer in qualifying.

"It is definitely a step forward," Hamilton said of the upgrade. "Everyone worked very hard to bring the upgrade here, as every team did but they have done a great job to put the car package to move forward in this fight to make us stronger for this battle.

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"I think we've all stepped forwards so I don't think it's really changed anything, the gap looks like it's within a tenth between us and Ferrari which is the same as last race, we've both made pretty much an identical step."

After struggling with tyre issues throughout the Russian Grand Prix, Hamilton is confident he is in better shape this weekend.

"It has started off well today, started on the right foot. In the last race, it did not start well and did not get any better. Today started really well but with P2 with the track being weird with the weather, wind, was a bit strange but generally it was still good. Hopefully that it continues in a positive way."