Mercedes: Schumacher can get back to F1, even with another team

Schumacher was dropped by Haas, and left Ferrari's young driver academy, at the end of last season after two years of mixed fortunes in F1.

While he had some impressive days of racing, there were also frustrations triggered by a number of high-profile crashes.

After losing his race seat, Mercedes wasted little time in signing Schumacher as its official reserve driver for 2023.

Mercedes boss Toto Wolff sees a lot of potential in Schumacher and thinks he could follow in the footsteps of Nyck de Vries, who Mercedes mentored in a similar way before he was snapped up by AlphaTauri.

"The most important factor is his personality," said Wolff about Schumacher. "He's a well-educated, intelligent, and talented young man.

"You can see it from his junior career track record, which was very good. I believe if you can give him a safe environment to further develop, he can be a good racing driver in a permanent seat in the future.

"And, in the same way, we have let Nyck de Vries go in order for him to achieve a career, that could be something that could happen to Mick. Whether it is in our team, or leaving to let him go somewhere else, we don't know at this stage."

Mick Schumacher, Mercedes Reserve Driver, Toto Wolff, Team Principal and CEO, Mercedes AMG

Photo by: Mercedes AMG

While having the Schumacher name at Mercedes provides a good marketing boost for the team, Wolff is clear that the young German's presence is a "gain" on the technical front too.

Haas and Ferrari were not convinced about Schumacher being a part of their own F1 future, but Wolff feels that his knowledge of the new generation of cars is a big plus.

"Where he will massively contribute is that he's driven the new car for a year," said Wolff.

"He has been in Formula 1 for two years, knows the tyres, knows the difficulties in the inherent DNA of the current F1 generation of cars, and he will be super helpful in the simulator and in assessing the car overall.

"It will be good to have him on track, in the debriefing room, and he's a credible young racing driver. So, from that perspective, we have definitely gained with Mick joining the team."