Lewis Hamilton believes that Ferrari now 'knows where our North Star is' after bringing substasntial upgrades to the Formula 1 Barcelona-Catalunya Grand Prix.

Ferrari brought the most upgrades of any team to Spain, with eight specific changes listed in the official FIA document. Rather than focusing on a single area, these were wholesale upgrades with alterations to the front wing, nose, floor, diffuser, and sidepod.

After banking consecutive podiums in Canada and Monaco, Hamilton scored the first front row berth of his Ferrari career on Saturday, and was quick to praise the new parts. 

"This is really down to everyone back at the factory; they've been working so hard," said the seven-time champion. 

"We kind of know where our North Star is, and for them to bring this upgrade here this weekend, I can’t thank them enough for the hard work that they’ve put in to bring it, because it’s a competition between all the teams to who can bring the most and it helps us close the gap. 

"The car felt great in qualifying. Obviously, they’re still so quick, the Mercedes, so still have work to do to fully close the gap or at least get ahead, but I’m really hoping that in the race, we can. 

"It would be nice for us to, for once, be able to hold on to them, but we’ll see."

Despite his strong qualifying result, with his time just 0.064s shy of George Russell's pole lap, the weekend hasn't been a straightforward one for Hamilton. 

On Friday, it looked as though the battle for pole would be fought between Mercedes and McLaren, with Ferrari some distance behind. But this turned on its head in the Saturday afternoon session, as McLaren faded and Ferrari charged. 

"It’s been a very tricky weekend for me, personally," Hamilton added. 

"[I] really struggled to get on pace after missing P1. I’ve never been so down before in a sense of the gap between Charles and I and to everybody else. It was half a second to eight-tenths. 

"I think it was one second in one session to the front row, so I needed to make a huge leap going into qualifying, and I knew where the time was. It was just having the confidence in the car, in the rear of the car. And I think we did a really good job, making adjustments."