Schu shocked at form

The Ferrari driver has won eight of the nine races on the calendar this season with his one and only anomaly being the Monaco Grand Prix where he crashed out after being hit by Juan Pablo Montoya in the tunnel while following the Safety Car.

With both Williams and McLaren putting in impressive lap times during pre-season testing, Schumacher thought he'd have his work cut out to clinch a seventh world title and played down the F2004 at its launch. The threat from his rivals though has failed to materialise.

"Never, not in my wildest dreams, could I have imagined such a season," he said. "I sincerely thought the opposite, that is, I thought it would be a really hard season. I'll say it again, as it is often said that it could be, an intentional misunderstanding: at the presentation of the F2004 at Maranello, we thought that the challenge for the title would be very difficult.

"Obviously we based our opinion on the data and the impression we had from the winter tests. Nothing then seemed to suggest that Ferrari would have such a successful season. We didn't try to play things down but only tried to be realistic."

While Williams and McLaren have failed to take the challenge to the reigning world champions, Schumacher faces a threat from a rejuvenated BAR squad.

"I think that BAR-Honda will remain the main adversary as they do well on all types of circuit.

"Saying this, I don't think that Renault or BMW-Williams should be underestimated as there will be races where they do very well. We also have to wait and see what McLaren-Mercedes do with their new car."