A spent force

Michael Schumacher cantered along the beach of Lake Geneva on his horse as he allowed his mind to wander. Above him were the peaks of the Swiss Alps reflected in the azure waters of Lake Geneva. To his right was his sprawling estate with a mansion so large that a walk from one end to the other was a work-out in itself. An adjoining set of rooms had been converted into a vast gallery in which were housed all the trophies he earned during his years as a racing driver as well as a replica of each one of his Formula One world championship winning cars. But Schumacher was not happy. He had it all but gained no satisfaction from any of it. He felt as burdened as if he and the horse had swapped roles and he, rather than the animal, was doing the carrying.

He stopped for a moment and fished out his telephone. He needed to speak to somebody who would understand exactly what he felt like. He had tried unburdening himself to Corinna but had been stung by her dismissal of his concerns as nothing more than megalomania. “I feel emasculated, Corinna,” he had said, “it’s almost as though someone’s snipped my bollocks off with a pair of scissors!” “You need to get over yourself, Michael,” his wife had remarked, “it’s not as though you are Alexander the Great weeping because you have no more worlds left to conquer.” He dialled a number in Helsinki. “Haloo,” came the voice of his old rival, Mika Hakkinen.

Schumacher: “Mika, I am bored out of my skull, old man. This retirement lark at 40 is driving me round the twist. How are you finding it?”
Hakkinen: “Life couldn’t be better. I just wish there were more hours in the day for me to enjoy it. I am eating what I like, drinking what I like and spending my nights with whomever I like, wherever I like. What’s not to like?”
Schumacher: “You Finns know a bit about partying that’s for sure, but that was never my scene, Mika. I need a new challenge.”
Hakkinen: “I see. You’ve come to the right guy, my old friend. Here’s what I’ll do for you. I’ll put a few well trained birds in my Gulf Stream and fly them down to you with detailed instructions. Trust me, man, once you’ve got through the blonde, the brunette, the Turk and the Eurasian, it’ll be a challenge to haul yourself out of bed!”

Schumacher sighed and ended the call. It was hopeless. Nobody understood that the only way he could feel alive was when roaring up to lesser men in a super F1 car and scaring the wits out of them. He was Schumacher the great. The man nobody messed with. The man they all feared. There was nothing else for it, he would have to arrange a trip to London to meet Ross Brawn. If there was a man who could make things happen for him, that man was Brawn.

All the events described above took place during the course of the autumn of 2009. They must seem like a bad dream to Michael Schumacher in mid-summer 2010 because his comeback has been nothing short of a disaster. Not only is he nowhere near as fast the young whippersnappers he derided in earlier conversations, he is treated with nothing like the deference on the circuit that he had grown to expect as his right. After the events of the Hungarian Grand Prix, it is clear that the myth of a super-skilled fearless racing animal has been shown to have been just that: a myth. Schumacher was very fast and very skilled in his heyday but he was also a bully. Yesterday, his crass attempt at proving his superiority over his former team-mate, Rubens Barrichello nearly resulted in Barrichello losing his life. A clearly faster Barrichello attempted an overtaking manoeuvre on Schumacher’s Mercedes and Schumacher felt slighted. To show who was boss, he came close to squeezing Barrichello into a brick wall. For this he earned a ten place grid penalty at the next Grand Prix but I think it is the clearest sign yet that Schumacher is a spent force rapidly in danger of becoming a laughing stock.

To see how potentially ghastly such a move can be take a look at this link to a Superleague Formula 2010 race yesterday at Brands Hatch:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=je71qzTdzx0&feature=related

Other than the Barrichello incident, it was an eventful race which demonstrated to the watching world that Red Bull is the team to beat this season. For the sixth time, Sebastian Vettel failed to convert a brilliant pole position into a win and was furious with everyone, himself included. Canny race strategy and masterful race control gave Mark Webber his fourth win of the season. The fact that he now leads the championship table could explain why he looked like a cat that has got away with the cream in the drivers’ post-race press conference. A few more races like this and he could be the first Australian world champion since Alan Jones in 1980.

McLaren, meanwhile, had a dismal day. Lewis Hamilton’s gearbox gave up the ghost and he was forced to retire quarter of the way into the race. Jenson Button could do no better than eighth place. Their team boss was heard muttering darkly about the possibility that Red Bull are using an illegal front wing but this could be no more than sour grapes that a team with as much experience as McLaren is being outperformed by a relative newcomer.

Fernando Alonso did a lot better for Ferrari by coming second but we have to wait until the decision of the World Motor Sports Council in the team-orders fiasco before we can tell how things will eventually pan out.

What is still fascinating this late into the season is that the championship could still go any one of five ways. The table is as follows:

Mark Webber 161 points
Lewis Hamilton 157
Sebastian Vettel 151
Jenson Button 147
Fernando Alonso 141
Felipe Massa 97
Nico Rosberg 94
Robert Kubica 89
Michael Schumacher 38
Adrian Sutil 35

The teams will now have their three week summer break to think what to do about the phenomenal pace of the Red Bull cars.

Gitau
2 August 2010