Vettel expecting Mercedes comeback on Saturday

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Sebastian Vettel expects Mercedes to come roaring back on Saturday after a subdued time in Friday's practice.

Vettel and his Ferrari team mate Kimi Raikkonen were comfortably ahead the first two free practice sessions. But Vettel believed that Mercedes were just playing things close to their chest.

"I think they will be fine; it's a circuit that suits them, so they will be strong tomorrow," he predicted.

"Last year people expected Williams to be fastest after the Friday, if I remember right," he pointed out. "It obviously turned out that Mercedes was the fastest. That's how sometimes you can be misled.

"I think there are a lot of things that we can play with in the car - fuel loads, engines, engine modes. This track, especially, there are a lot of things that you can show or not show.

"I think the most important step is we talk about ourselves, our balance, and as I said I was able to improve, so I'm reasonably happy."

Ferrari stays in charge in Sochi second practice

While Vettel set the fastest time of the day in the afternoon, Raikkonen had been on top in the morning session.

"It's been quite a nice Friday, things have been running smoothly," said the Finn. "I'm happy with the car so it's more fun right now.

"It's only Friday, we have no idea what the others are doing, but so far we've started well. Quite happy out in front today, so we have to try to make a good day tomorrow and then go from there.

"Tomorrow's another day."

GALLERY: All the pictures from Friday in Sochi

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.