MONZA, Italy -- Valtteri Bottas kept Mercedes top of the pile in second practice for the Italian Grand Prix, a session which saw Ferrari and championship leader Sebastian Vettel close to within 0.140s.
Mercedes had been a full second ahead of Ferrari in FP1 but that gap came down dramatically for the afternoon's qualifying simulations. Bottas' 1:21.406 was 0.056s quicker than teammate Lewis Hamilton, who had topped FP1, and only a tenth up on Vettel's best time.
The gap between the front runners is much closer to what people were expecting from this weekend after Ferrari ran Mercedes close at the Belgian Grand Prix weekend.