2000 JAPANESE GP
SUZUKA FERRARI F12000
1
There can be little debate about the number-one race on this list, for Schumacher chose it as his greatest for Autosport’s Race of my life series in 2009.
The combination of the long-awaited first world championship with Ferrari and a relentless lights-to-flag battle with his favourite adversary
Mika Hakkinen made this the most special of Schumacher’s triumphs.
Schumacher led only 19 laps to Hakkinen’s 33 but, thanks to a charge between the Finn’s final pitstop and his own, Schumacher went from the hunter to the hunted in their fight for glory.
It was far from a straightforward charge though – he had three laps in which to build a gap after Hakkinen’s Mclaren had stopped, and had to contend with rain in the air and the spinning Benetton of Alex Wurz, but he still managed to emerge fractionally ahead of Hakkinen.
The gap between the two standout performers in F1 of the time was never larger than six seconds, and Schumacher admitted that Hakkinen pushed him to his very limits in a race that – in his own words – required more than 40 qualifying laps.
“All my life, I will never forget that radio signal from Ross [Brawn],” Schumacher said in 2009. “I was driving down the pitlane after my second stop, and he said over the radio, ‘It’s looking good, it’s looking good’. I was very tense, and fully expecting him to say, ‘It was looking good’, but suddenly he said, ‘It’s looking bloody good!’ For over 40 laps Mika and I did almost identical times, like a perpetual qualifying lap. Mika was fantastic and pushed me to the very limits.”
On crossing the finish line to seal his first world title for Ferrari, Schumacher hit his steering wheel so hard that Ferrari decided to take it out of service in case it was damaged. He added: “I was repeatedly asked what my predominant feelings were at that moment [crossing the finish line], and on no single occasion was I able to find the right words. I didn’t know what to do with this happiness.”
The next four years would bring four more world championship titles for the Schumacher/ Ferrari partnership.