It was a day to forget for Lewis Hamilton at the British Grand Prix at the weekend, finishing a lacklustre race in second, losing out to Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel.

The Brit suffered from wheelspin at the start of proceedings before Kimi Raikkonen’s left front made contact with the right rear of Hamilton’s car which sent him spinning to the back of the field.

However, things did get better for the four-time Formula One world champion as he produced a remarkable comeback to finish second.

Raikkonen's collision with Hamilton wasn’t the first time a Ferrari driver has made contact with a Mercedes.

Vettel was involved in a clash with Valtteri Bottas, clipping the Finn’s car and causing damage, later receiving a five-second penalty for his antics.

Despite Mercedes losing out on top spot on Sunday, their trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin revealed in a Pure Pitwall YouTube video that the side are doing their best to improve.

Quoted by Autosport, he said: "We are doing a lot of work here this week trying to understand that, because we know fine well that if we qualify on pole we have got to get off the line as well as the Ferraris and that is what we will be trying to do in Hockenheim."

Shovlin also said that ‘there was less grip on the grid’ and that caused Hamilton’s wheelspin when asked what went wrong on Sunday.

"The simple answer is that we got some wheelspin. There was a bit less grip on the grid than we were expecting.

"We had done practice starts there and at Silverstone they do actually allow you do a start from the grid.

"But for some reason on Sunday we didn't quite have what we expected and as soon as you get the wheelspin you lose traction and that lost him places quickly."

He also revealed that Hamilton’s car didn’t suffer any damage after his collision with Raikkonen.

"We didn't have much damage at all,” he added.

"It was quite a big impact and we were pretty lucky to get away with it.

"The reality though was that you heard Lewis complaining about damage to his floor.

"We thought that there might have been some aerodynamic damage but that was just from running in the turbulent air of all those cars ahead when he was having to fight through.