• Korean Grand Prix - FP2

'We're going for it' - Rosberg

Nico Rosberg believes Mercedes has closed the gap to Red Bull in Korea © Sutton Images

Enlarge

Related Links

• Race:
• Korean Grand Prix

Nico Rosberg says that Mercedes' pace in practice for the Korean Grand Prix is down to continued development of its 2013 car.

Lewis Hamilton was fastest in the two Friday sessions, with Rosberg in the top four alongside Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel in both FP1 and FP2. With Hamilton encouraged by the progress made throughout the day, Rosberg said it was a sign of Mercedes' continued work on its 2013 car paying off.

"We're going for it," Rosberg said. "Of course the resources are moving more and more towards next year but we're still also pushing for this year and the aim is still to win races."

Rosberg speculated that Red Bull might have more pace in hand, but at the very least expects to be able to push it harder than it did in Singapore where Vettel dominated.

"It seemed to be a good day today. Red Bull is always going to be very difficult to beat - they're very quick - but maybe we're quite close and it seems to be going well … I don't know what sort of fuel levels they were running today but it seems like we're looking better than Singapore."

One area Rosberg said he had encountered issues was using the super soft tyre on high fuel.

"On the option we're struggling a little bit on the long run because of the graining on the front. Graining is when the front surface of the tyre starts to ripple and starts to open up so that's a bit of a difficult one, but on the harder tyre it was OK."

© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.