Schumacher rolls back the years
Golden oldie still has it but penalty strips him of pole
MICHAEL SCHUMACHER yesterday revived the champion buried deep in his past. At 43, for one afternoon at least, the German, who ruled the world seven times, vindicated his decision to come out of retirement to compete against Formula One’s ranks of swift, voraciously ambitious young men.
Many are young enough to be his children. Yet none was swift enough, or aggressive enough, to withstand Schumacher. He has waited two-and-ahalf years to deliver such a drive, since Mercedes bankrolled the greatest pension plan he could have dreamed of when they committed 60million euros over three years to associate themselves with Germany’s highest-profile sportsman of a generation.
In all this time, Schumacher has looked to be an impostor, a sad parody of his former self. Age had overtaken him, said paddock cynics.
But yesterday, on a track where he has won five times and where a driver’s skill can compensate for technical deficiencies in his car, Schumacher proved himself the fastest man ahead of this afternoon’s Monaco Grand Prix.
‘It’s a reminder I am still around,’ he said. ‘I’m thrilled and excited and, after all I’ve been through the last two-and-ahalf years, it’s fabulous. This confirms what I have felt I was capable of for a long time. Just beautiful.’
With Schumacher, however, nothing is ever straightforward. He claimed pole with breathtaking verve and outrageous nerve, yet he will start from sixth on the grid today after being given a five-place penalty for causing an accident with Bruno Senna in the last race in Barcelona a fortnight ago.
On pole today will be Mark Webber, at 36 another veteran, with Nico Rosberg, 26, alongside him on the front row and Britain’s Lewis Hamilton, 27, a handily placed third in his McLaren.
‘Anything can happen at Monaco and I’ll give everything tomorrow,’ said Hamilton. Webber, with typical grace, added: ‘It’s Michael’s day.’
No man has polarised public opinion in a racing car quite like Schumacher, a winner of 91 Formula One races. The last time he challenged for pole position here on these streets in 2006, the season he retired, Schumacher was so desperate to thwart Fernando Alonso from posting a faster time that he deliberately crashed at the final, slow-speed corner called La Rascasse, to form a road block. Stewards later banished him to the back of the grid for the next day’s race.
Former world champion Keke Rosberg said that night: ‘It was the worst thing I have seen in Formula One. I thought he had grown up. He is a cheap cheat. He should leave F1 to honest people.’
Nowadays, Schumacher is driving alongside Rosberg’s son, Nico.
After being told on his car radio that he was the fastest in qualifying, Schumacher raised a gloved hand above his head. With an index finger, he anointed himself No 1. His first world title was coloured in controversy, when he collided with Damon Hill in Australia to end the British driver’s bid for glory in the final miles of the last race of 1994.
Three years later, Schumacher drove Jacques Villeneuve off the road in Jerez; but this time he was held culpable and Villeneuve was crowned champion. Then followed the Ferrari years.
To some, team-mates like Rubens Barrichello and Eddie Irvine acted as Jeeves to his Bertie Wooster, allowing Schumacher to travel uninterrupted to five titles in succession with Ross Brawn in command of the Scuderia.
Of course, on many days no one disputed Schumacher’s genius at the wheel. In a race car, he was a baby-faced assassin. And when he hinted he was bored in retirement, Brawn lobbied to form a new alliance with him, at Mercedes. His best result so far has been fourth place, in Canada last year.
Jenson Button, 13th for McLaren today, searched for a perspective on Schumacher’s performance yesterday when he said: ‘Michael has come in for a lot of criticism over the last couple of years. We forget what he delivered in a previous career and today he put a great lap together. Even so, I bet he’s disappointed to be sixth and not pole.’
Schumacher has no one but himself to blame for that. But if the odds are stacked heavily against him winning this afternoon, he has at least reminded the world that the old man can still be competitive.