After six of 22 races in the 2022 Formula 1 season, Mick Schumacher is the only regular driver alongside Nicholas Latifi who has not yet scored any points in the World Championship. In Miami (collision with Sebastian Vettel) and Barcelona (relapse at the end of the race) he was close. But after 27 races he is still waiting for the first point of his career.
The Haas team has not publicly criticized Schumacher. But Günther Steiner makes no secret of it, “that we have to score points everywhere and we have to score points with both drivers. There is hard work behind it, but at some point we have to succeed,” says the team boss.
Kevin Magnussen has scored points on three of the six weekends so far and is tenth in the Drivers’ Championship with 15 points. Steiner thinks it’s possible that the first point result could also untie a knot for Schumacher: “That would give him self-confidence. It’s hard to say whether it also has an effect on his pure driving performance.”
“Last week could have been a good week,” says Steiner. “And before that, Miami was a good weekend too. But it’s never worked. Every time things go well, something happens. We’re almost there. At some point it will work out, because the car is good enough. I’m sure he can do it.”
Steiner does not fear that Schumacher could become overconfident once he has scored points for the first time: “I’m more concerned that he becomes desperate and tries too hard, the car runs over. That could be more likely to happen. But I think he’s very close. The most important thing now is to be patient.”
Schumacher was 14th in Barcelona. In the end, he was half a minute short of tenth place (Yuki Tsunoda in the AlphaTauri). Schumacher was still ahead of the Japanese on lap 57 of 66. But with his two-stop strategy and the oldest tires in the field (35 laps old Medium at the end), he was passed behind in the last ten laps.
“In the first stint it became apparent that three stops are better. But we haven’t changed the strategy,” says Schumacher. “But we can learn from that, we have to understand that. The team had several meetings on this and I think we understand what the problem is. I’m sure we have it better under control now.”
“We knew that the hard tire didn’t work. The medium was okay, but not as good as two soft sets. The medium had a better reputation than it ended up having. That’s unfortunate, but if you react a lap or two too late, it turns around pretty quickly.”
“Sometimes it’s a matter of seconds. If you’ve passed the pit entrance, it will cost you a lap. Then you discuss half a round again, and the next round is gone. Two laps, and that cost us four positions in our case,” he calculates.
Schumacher does not share Steiner’s fear that he could risk too much under pressure and lose the necessary calm: “There are still many races to come. It’s all about using them properly,” he says coolly, but at the same time makes it clear: “I want to collect points. That’s what I’m here for. I want to be as far up front as possible in the World Cup.”
“The last two races have been very good. I felt like we could have scored points. For various reasons, we didn’t succeed. It’s not like it puts me under a lot of pressure. I’m just looking forward to driving the car,” said Schumacher in front of Monaco.
This article was written by Christian Nimmervoll, co-author: Jonathan Noble
Soccer, Formula 1, tennis and more in a sports package
The original of this post “It’s never worked out”: Own team boss counts on Mick Schumacher” comes from Motorsport-Total.com.
