Lewis Hamilton was in upbeat mood on Sunday at Imola after his charge from 12th on the grid to fourth at the flag, and he was particularly happy with how he felt at one with the Ferrari SF-25 on the medium tyres.
There have been other sparks of hope in recent weeks, notably of course the Shanghai sprint, but also the odd race stint elsewhere.
The question now is can that Imola performance translate to Monaco and other upcoming races?
Lewis and the team did their best to ensure that it does by taking advantage of the track’s proximity to Maranello. The day after the race – and before he headed home to Monaco – he was hard at work in the factory, punching the numbers with his engineers, and seeing what could be learned.
“I was in the simulator on Monday,” he said when I asked him on Thursday if he had done a deep dive into the Imola data in search of answers. “I was there nice and early Monday morning.
“It’s really incredible to see. Probably people don’t realise, but the engineers and mechanics, it does not stop.
“They go straight from the track, you go home Sunday night and they’re in the factory the next day. It just does not stop, they’re churning through the data.
“Yes, there’s lots of, lots of positives, as we said last weekend to take from it. There’s still areas that we need to improve on.
“Clearly, our qualifying has been our biggest weakness so far this year. We’re not extracting the performance from the tyres, and that’s something we are working on.”
Time is of the essence, and as each race weekend goes by so team and driver get to know each other better and have more opportunity to try stuff.
“I had some ideas, the team had some ideas,” said Lewis. “And so we’ll try those this weekend. It’s not the best place to try those things, but we will try to make a step, and qualifying, as you know, is everything here.
“It’s a natural progression. I’m feeling more at home in the team. Things work differently here. They’ve never had anyone like me here, and so it’s been challenging on both sides, but we’re really finding harmony, I think, in the way that we’re moving forwards.”
The learning process is ongoing. Hamilton may have done seven races with Ferrari already, but Monaco is a law unto itself, and this is his first time here with the red car.
“I’m still in that first year with this team, every weekend is something new, like the last weekend was the first time I’ve been into the European races, seeing the truck, finding my room, getting accustomed to a new layout.
“And this weekend, walking into the garage, it’s all red, and that’s the first time I’ve been in Monaco.
“I’ve never been in the Ferrari garage at Monaco, always walked past it, always wondered what it like to be in the team. Still having to pinch myself – it’s awesome.
“And I have for years always wondered what a Ferrari would feel like around this track. Even my first year, I think the Ferraris were very strong, Felipe and Kimi were very strong. And obviously Charles in the last few years has been rapid here.
“You can see the car works a lot different to what I had driven in the past. How that will reflect this weekend, I don’t know. I’m definitely excited to experience it.”
Meanwhile like other drivers Lewis has to adapt to the new two-stop tyre regulations in place this weekend.
“I think it’s good to try something different,” he said. “You keep doing the same thing over and over and over, you can get the same result. And so I think it’s cool that they’re trying something different.
“Whether or not it’s the answer, we’ll find out this weekend, it’s definitely going to be different to what we’ve had in the past. Whether that’s better I have no idea, I can’t predict. But I like that we have something different.”
Adam Cooper F1 