Schumacher the Greatest
Atty. Jerome G. Neri
The Scrutineer
AS OF this writing, one of my greatest heroes, Michael Schumacher, is still in a medically induced coma after a horrible freak skiing accident. He is still in critical condition. The doctors cannot yet give a prognosis on his chances of survival and describes his condition as still life threatening. I hope by the time this is published Schumacher will be recovering well in this most important race of his life.
To Me, Schumacher is the greatest F1 driver in history. He did not have to be in the best car to win. His won his first world championship in his Benneton-Ford, which had 80 bhp less than his rivals.
Here are some significant drives of Schumacher that makes him the greatest:
The 1994 Spanish Grand Prix. This race illustrated the adaptability of Schumacher as a driver. For two-thirds of the race Schumacher’s gearbox was stuck in fifth gear. He had to make a pit stop in fifth gear and not stall the engine. Having to find different racing lines for the car to work, he was driving his car like a kart and managed to finish the race in second place. If this situation was given to any other driver, the driver would have retired from the race. Schumacher brought it home on the podium.
The 1995 Belgian Grand Prix. In this race, qualifying was in very tricky conditions with changeable weather. As a result, Schumacher qualified way back in 16th race. The race started out as a dry race. Schumacher was somewhere in the midfield when it started to rain. Everybody pit for rain tires while Schumacher stayed on dry tires. The rain was only in part of the track and another part of the track was dry. Schumacher found himself in the lead with Damon Hill behind six seconds a lap faster. Schumacher made the most of it in the dry part of the track and defended heavily in the wet part. The inevitable happened, Schumacher was passed by Damon Hill, but by the time Hill overtook Schumacher, the rain had already stopped and the racetrack was quickly drying. Hill had to pit once again for dry tires handing the lead to Schumacher, who went on to win the race.
The 1996 Spanish Grand Prix. Schumacher is known as the rainmaster because of this race. The 1996 season was the first season of Schumacher as a Ferrari driver. His Ferrari was not a competitive car, as Ferrari was too conservative in interpreting the new rules and constructed a cockpit that was huge and gave an aerodynamic disadvantage. This was aggravated by an unreliable all new V10 engine. There was torrential rain in this race, and we saw what probably was the finest demonstration of driving skill that has never been replicated by anyone. At the start of the race we saw Schumacher lose a few places but by lap two he was in the lead lapping four seconds a lap faster than anyone else. He finished the race 45 seconds ahead of second place and lapped everybody up to fourth place. This was achieved in an inferior and uncompetitive Ferrari.
The 1998 Hungarian Grand Prix. Going into this race Schumacher was 16 points behind Mika Hakkinen in the championship. For his championship hopes to stay alive, Schumacher had to finish ahead of Mika Hakkinen and better yet win the race. When the race started Schumacher found himself in third place behind Hakkinen and Coulthard. Something magical had to be done. Ross Brawn of Ferrari switched Schumacher to a three stop strategy and made Schumacher pit early on his second stop. His in lap and out lap was so quick that after Coulthard and Hakkinen pit, they emerged five seconds behind Schumacher. But Schumacher needed to stop again so he had to pull a big enough gap to retain the lead and win. What we saw was a Ferrari being driven to the limit lap after lap. Never have we seen a Formula 1 car driven this way for so many consecutive laps in the history of F1.
We have seen a lot of passion from all the other great drivers such as Ayrton Senna, Gilles Villenueve, Jackie Stewart, Alain Prost. Apart from passion, Michael Schumacher showed us magic and it is this magic that makes him the greatest F1 driver in my book.
We need that Schumacher magic one last time for his full recovery.
My prayers go out to the family of Michael Schumacher.
