Interview with Michael Schumacher

He had the worst year of his Formula One career, and yet Michael Schumacher still finished third in the World Championship. In so doing, he scored more points than the teammates of the two title contenders, as well as the rest of the field.

Of course, the 10 points he was gifted in the United States Grand Prix improved the situation somewhat, and without them he would have dropped behind both Juan Pablo Montoya and Giancarlo Fisichella in the final reckoning. It's true that the chances are that Michael would in any case have scored something at Indy, but so, probably, would they.

Nevertheless, the fact that even in such a disastrous season he still amassed a respectable total says a great deal about the German's ability to make the most out of a given situation. Even with a tyre disadvantage, Schumacher (and Ferrari) beat Toyota, BAR and Williams as well as half of McLaren and Renault. Having said that, seven points in the last six races was a pretty poor way to end the season, and perhaps reflected the fact that the real effort was being put into 2006.

He had a few clunkers, notably in China, and probably became involved in more incidents than the last three or four seasons put together, mainly because he was not in his familiar position of being out front and out of trouble.

But it's easy to overlook the fact that three times this year he finished second, and in any one of those races it would have taken only one more retirement to put him on the top step of the podium and gain a degree of respectability. Not that he's ever relied on other people's problems to win races in the past.

As ever, the real litmus test is your teammate. Ferrari insiders have always said that they know when the car is good, because Michael's partner, whoever it might be, was that much closer. As soon as there were problems, the gap would grow again. Only at the Nurburgring this year did Rubens Barrichello actually finish ahead of Schumacher, after the World Champion was badly delayed in a first corner skirmish. Elsewhere, the Brazilian was left behind, and often the margin was significant.

A lot of people have already made the mistake of writing Schumacher off, but as he's shown before, that's a dangerous game. After his mare of a year, we now know he's mortal, and perhaps more than ever before the man himself is aware that he can't go on forever, and the end of the road can't be far away.

But what about taking time off from his end of season holiday to have a go on a Moto GP bike? Doesn't sound like someone whose instincts are tuning into self-preservation, as is usually the case with those nearing retirement.

He can still win races over the next couple of years, and an eighth World Championship will surely be the greatest achievement of his career, and surely motivation enough to spur him on. After all, Ferrari have as much chance as anyone else of getting the V8 package right from the off, and this week's confirmation that tyre changes will return will have brought big smiles to the faces of folk in both Maranello and Tokyo. He will be back...

Michael Schumacher: "It is true in a way, this was our hardest season since I drove for Ferrari. But this goes mainly if you only look at the results; and this is something I do not do. Sure we have been winning less than ever in my time in Ferrari, but I can tell you that we have had far harder years - the ones before we finally won the Championship. They may be more successful from the pure numbers, but they have been much more exhausting mentally."

Q: What was your feeling before Melbourne about how competitive you would be this season?

Schumacher: "We came to Melbourne with our old car, so it was clear to me we would not fight for victory there - at least not to my expectations. Obviously, with my bad luck in qualifying, this race wasn't exactly an ideal one. But to be honest, I knew before the season started that it would not be a good one."

Q: How did you feel after the first couple of races, and did you still think that the new car would make a difference?

Schumacher: "Let´s put it like this: I knew it would mean a big step forward, and I knew we would need a big step, too. But I knew the new car from testing and knew about the problems we sometimes had there."

Q: Did the early reliability problems come as a shock?

Schumacher: "No, as I said, I knew about them. There were not a surprise in the very first races as we clearly had rushed very much to use the car."

Q: In Imola you had a great drive to second. Can you tell us about that race and your chase of Fernando Alonso?

Schumacher: "First of all, it was a great race from Fernando. Like over the season, he was driving very strong mentally. All I could do when finally being behind him was just pushing and hoping he would make any slight mistake. He didn't do me that favour, he did not show any minor weakness. But it was big fun, and I am sure for him as well. For us, Imola clearly was a highlight in that strange season."

Q: How did you feel after Imola? Did you think, we can still do something this year?

Schumacher: "Yes, sure. We were convinced that with a season so long and with a lot of hard work we could find the nucleus of our grip problem. Imola seemed to be kind of a new start into the season."

Schumacher: "It was not only Rubens who seemed to be upset - my brother seemed to be upset, too. To be honest, in both cases I did not quite understand it."

Q: You've had a lot of races this year where you were fighting to even get in the points, and there must have been times when you felt you had driven as well as when you scored your 84 wins. Is that right, and how did you feel about it?

Schumacher: "You know, things generally are not that simple, neither in life nor in racing. It is not like if you win you automatically have been good. There are victories with a poor performance and losses with a great one. Some of the races this year were just great, even if I had to fight for points instead of wins. All in all, I would not say that my driving was worse this year than last year, even if the results might indicate that."

Q: Were you actually able to enjoy some of the fights you had further down the field, running wheel to wheel with people?

Schumacher: "Yes, sometimes it was just great. Like in Monaco, that was real fun. In the end, it is down to competition, and if I am able to compete then that's what I want. Sure, the ideal thing is to compete [for] victory, but a good fight is never bad."

Q: During the year you had incidents with Nick Heidfeld, David Coulthard, Mark Webber, Takuma Sato. All were in different circumstances, but what can you say about them, and did it sometimes feel that nothing would go right?

Schumacher: "Well, maybe. There were moments when it looked like this, yes. Maybe most so in Spa - even if that race had turned out to be much less promising for us than we hoped it would be the case in rain. But then, it did not rain either!"

Q: What for you was the high point of 2005?

Schumacher: "There wasn't really a race I could mention here except for Imola. Instead, I would very much like to mention our team. You know, sometimes you could see how tired the guys were, but they never gave up, they just went on and on - even if sometimes the results in testing were not exactly encouraging. To see that, was my personal high point of a year like 2005."

Schumacher: "Hmm, difficult. Probably Istanbul. Malaysia was not good at all, too. To some degree also Monza - we really had wished to do good there but it turned out we were not even good enough for points." [Note: Michael was talking before his wild race in China!]

Q: What can you say about the difficulties Bridgestone experienced in adapting to the single tyre rule, and is it fair to point only in the direction of the tyres, or were there weaknesses in the whole package compared to past years?

Schumacher: "We never pointed only in one direction, we always said we are a team and we share a problem. It is fair to say we had a grip level problem this year, but grip has never been only produced by tyres and we never said so. Maybe we all have been a bit too conservative in our approach to the new rules. Let's find out how we approach next year."

Q: You have done an amazing job to keep the title for five years and you knew it would end some day. How do you really feel, and what do you think about some of the negative comments from people with short memories?

Schumacher: "I have had great times in Formula One, and I feel I will again be able to have great times there. Nobody can take away from us what we have achieved, and it would have been highly unrealistic to expect it just would go on like this until the end. Nobody in our team is unrealistic, so the disappointment about the Championship being out of our reach was purely on the sporting side."

Q: A new V8 era is beginning, you have a new teammate, and obviously you and everyone else in the team want to fight back and win. How do you view next season?

Schumacher: "Exactly as you just described: go back and fight back. We clearly want to make this year a one-off show. I know it will be very hard and I know that probabilities say it is very unlikely but, hey, it´s a challenge!"

Q: Like us you have been watching the battle between Alonso and Raikkonen, Renault and McLaren. What do you think of those guys and the way this year has gone for them?

Schumacher: "They are both great guys, no doubt about that. I have already said that very often. Both are very talented, both are very focussed, both just did a very good job. Still, the year developed in very different directions for them. Obviously Fernando has won the Championship and he clearly deserved so, as he never missed any chance he got and nearly didn't do any mistake. So congratulations to him!"