Spa: Schumacher's field of dreams

Michael Schumacher, more than any other modern driver is synonymous with Spa-Francorchamps.

The German made his debut there as a 23-year-old fledgling, 20 years ago this weekend, having never seen the majestic Ardennes track before turning up in those green Seven Up Jordan overalls. What happened next went down in history as one of F1's most impressive debut weekends - even in spite of him not completing a single racing lap.

But since then the seven-time world champion has owned Spa. Until his retirement in 2006, 12 races heralded 10 finishes and in none of them did he place lower than second. He won six times - a record - and scored his maiden grand prix victory on only his second visit to the track.

Of the two races he was not classified in during that period, the first in 1994, he actually won on the road before being disqualified for shaving the plank too thin when spinning over a kerb. The other occasion was in 1998, when he crashed into David Coulthard in heavy rain, before storming down to the McLaren pit intent on venting fury.

Since his return to the sport with Mercedes, Schumacher's best finish at Spa was seventh last year. But the place has always been kind to him, so what price a podium finish... or dare we say it... a victory - an amazing 19 years after his first.

Spa-Francorchamps driver notes

• Sebastian Vettel has qualified in the top 10 at Spa every year since his last season with Toro Rosso (2008), but Spa is one of the few tracks where he hasn't reached won, the others being Fuji (best result eighth), Indianapolis (7th), Magny-Cours (12th) and the Nurburgring (third). If he finishes third from now until the end of the championship he will take his second world title, regardless of his rivals' results.

• Mark Webber has enjoyed good form at Spa in recent years, qualifying and finishing in the top 10 in the last five Belgian Grands Prix. He has retired from the race only twice and his qualifying tally against his various team-mates here is 6-1, beaten only by Vettel two years ago.

• Excluding 2009, when he had a tough time in qualifying and then had an accident on the opening lap, Lewis Hamilton has qualified and finished in the top four every time, winning in 2010.

• Jenson Button's scorecard in Spa shows three accidents and three mechanical failures out of nine starts. He last scored points at the track in 2005, when he finished third. The last four races have been particularly bad: only once has he managed to see the chequered flag, in 2008, when he finished 15th!

• Another driver with a troubled relationship with Spa is Fernando Alonso: he scored two podiums in 2005 and 2007, but hasn't finished there since coming fourth in 2008. He has qualified inside the top 10 five times out of seven, but has never started from the F1 front row in Belgium.

• Felipe Massa won in 2008 after Hamilton's penalty and was second in 2007, completing a Ferrari one-two on that occasion when Kimi Raikkonen won. He's qualified and finished in the top 10 in every Belgian GP since 2004.

• It's a big weekend for Michael Schumacher, who made his F1 debut at Spa twenty years ago with Jordan, when he qualified a headline-grabbing seventh. He has a special affinity with this track: he posted his maiden win here in 1992 and is the most successful driver ever to compete on the circuit (with six wins to Senna's five). His qualifying tally against his team-mates is 12-2.

• Nick Heidfeld has had a career of two halves at Spa, failing to finish in the points from 2000 to 2004 and then scoring respectably with BMW Sauber between 2007 and 2009, although only one of those points finishes was a podium. The last time he was beaten by a team-mate in qualifying was nine years ago, by Felipe Massa when they both drove for Sauber.

• Rubens Barrichello Spa report card shows he took advantage of those glorious Ferrari years, finishing on the podium both in 2002 (second) and 2004 (third). He's had leaner times with other manufacturers, scoring just two points in the last four GPs. He's retired in eight out of sixteen starts (five accidents, three mechanical failures).

• Pastor Maldonado won twice in the GP2 series here: in the 2008 sprint race and last year in the feature one.

• Sergio Perez raced four times in GP2 here, winning last year's sprint race in front of Giedo van der Garde and Alvaro Parente.

• Heikki Kovalainen's best result came in 2009, sixth from the fifteenth grid spot. In 2008 he was third on the grid, but had to serve a drive-through which put him out of contention.

• Although Jarno Trulli has nailed one pole position and two front row starts at Spa, his long career has yielded only one point, in 1998's wet race where he was lapped twice in the Prost. He has outqualified team-mates here 10-2.

• Daniel Ricciardo has raced in four Formula Renault 3.5 events here: his best results came in race two last year where he finished fifth.

• Factoring in Timo Glock's GP2 career, his best result in Spa is a ninth place.

• Jerome d'Ambrosio has raced six times on his home track in the GP2 Series. He finished second from pole in the 2008 sprint race, then endured four straight retirements. He was running second in last year's feature race when his engine gave up.

Spa-Francorchamps team notes

• Red Bull has taken podium finishes at the last two Belgian Grands Prix, but has neither won nor got both drivers home in the points.

• McLaren has won thirteen times in Belgium and in the last six years has missed the podium only once, in 2009.

• Ferrari is the most successful team to have raced in Belgium - with sixteen wins. The last three came in successive years, from 2007 to 2009, but the team's qualifying pace has been on the slide. Ferrari's last pole at Spa came in 2007 and the last front row start the following year.

• Mercedes won at Spa in 1955 but hasn't been seen on the podium since, even in the present team's past two incarnations (Brawn and Honda).

• Renault won in 1983 with Alain Prost, but has failed to finish in 16 out of 29 starts. The team made up for that last year with a double-finish (Kubica third and Petrov ninth), its first at Spa since 1984.

• Only one points finish in the last three years for Williams at Spa - an eighth by Nico Rosberg in 2009. That event was also the last time a Williams car led a race (also Rosberg).

• The 2009 Belgian GP was an historic one for Force India, which took its only pole, podium finish and race lead. Last year it achieved a double points finish with Sutil in fifth and Liuzzi in tenth.

• Sauber has an excellent run of results in Spa, scoring points every time since 2004. Its last retirement came in 2002 (Massa, engine failure). The last Belgian Grand Prix to forget for Sauber was in 2001: zero laps completed by both cars.

• Toro Rosso notched up its best Spa result in 2008 with both drivers in the top 10 in qualifying (Bourdais ninth, Vettel tenth) and in the points (Vettel fifth, Bourdais seventh).

DID YOU KNOW THAT...

In the past six years the winner started from pole only once (2007, Raikkonen). In the last eighteen Belgian Grands Prix only three wins came from pole.

The last ten Belgian Grand Prix have been won by either McLaren or Ferrari - with five apiece. The last winner for a different manufacturer was Damon Hill in 1998 with the Jordan-Mugen.

The last Belgian GP run below 200km/h dates back to 2004: Raikkonen won at 198.898km/h, with the race being influenced by three safety car interventions. Excluding the races with safety cars, to find another one below 200km/h we have to go back to Michael Schumacher's maiden win - in 1992 (191.428km/h).

The last pole below 200km/h was Barrichello's maiden one in 1994: heavy rain, allied to a chicane in the middle of Eau Rouge resulted in an average speed of only 178.542km/h, the slowest in the circuit's history. To find another sub-200km/h pole lap at Spa you have to go back to 1955.

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- The Autosport.com Team

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