car & engine upgrades
The son of the seven-time Formula One champion Michael Schumacher, Mick, is one of the most coveted young pilots: the famous surname, financial support and the title of the European Formula 3 opened the doors to any racing projects for the 19-year-old German. Nevertheless, the guy, until recently, refused to follow the usual path of the young star and did not join any of the youth programs of the F-1 teams, although Ferrari actively invoked Mick in their ranks, while Mercedes registered in the column “partners “On the official website of the guy and attracted him to participate in advertising projects.
Yesterday, the younger Schumacher finally made a choice and signed a contract with the Ferrari Academy. Such a decision can hardly be called illogical: the main rivals of scarlet have recently found difficulty in racing for their protégés, and putting a career to the top of motor racing is dangerous to trust them – to repeat the fate of Esteban Okon, who turned out to be a reservist of the “three-beams”, Schumacher hardly wanted. Scuderia, on the contrary, raised the young Charles LeClair to the main team and pushed Antonio Giovinazzi into Sauber, so at the moment the Italian program really looks more effective.
How good is Schumacher?
Top teams are fighting a fierce struggle only for the real ones. Over the past five years, this has happened only with Max Verstappen: in 2014, for the super-talented 16-year-old Dutchman, who won 7 races for the average team in European Formula 3 by that moment, the race between Mercedes and Red Bull . Then the “three-beam” were also defeated because of the shortcomings of their own system: the “bulls” offered an instant debut in F-1 as part of Toro Rosso, and the Brackley guys had nothing to hide.
Also, major manufacturers (Ferrari, Renault and Mercedes) also supported Esteban Okon during his career, but this is not a struggle: Scuderia simply rewarded the Frenchman with prize tests and classes at his Academy for winning youth series. , but the Frenchman signed the first contract with the Lotus Renault program. He went to Mercedes without any kind of war and competition: the team academy from Enstone was simply closed when finance was cut, and Okon asked for himself under the wing of Toto Wolff.
Nevertheless, both Okona and Verstappen are connected by powerful junior achievements: both the Dutchman and the Frenchman won both in karting and Formula 3, and Esteban even managed to catch the title in the debut season in GP3. Is Schumacher able to compare with them in talent?