29 December 2023 , 13:38
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Mick Schumacher has been "unfairly" deprived of his father's guidance and support during his own racing career.
Young Mick is son of seven-time world champion Michael who supported his son's karting career as a boy. However, he has been unable to do so since suffering life-changing injuries in a skiing accident 10 years ago, which left him needing round-the-clock care.
In the decade that followed, Mick rose through the ranks and won the Formula 2 championship. He made his Formula 1 debut in 2021 with Haas and earned a second season with the team, but was axed as a result of a series of expensive crashes and not enough points scored to make up for it.
Now 24, he is a reserve driver for Mercedes and will race in the World Endurance Championship next year as part of the Alpine entry. And throughout it all, he has been deprived of opportunities to speak with his father about his career.
Clearly, it is a situation Mick has found hard to come to terms with. In 2021, he was emotional as he expressed his sorrow over the situation. "I think dad and me, we would understand each other in a different way now," he said.
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"Simply because we speak a similar language - the language of motorsport. We would have had much more to talk about and that is where my head is most of the time, thinking that would be so cool. That would be it. I would give up everything just for that. Yes.
"Since the accident, of course, these experiences, these moments that I believe many people have with their parents are no longer present, or to a lesser extent. In my view, that is a little unfair."
Michael's old Benetton team-mate Johnny Herbert also understands how difficult it must be for the younger Schumacher. "Mick has said he could always talk to Michael about racing before the accident and that is one of the saddest things for any sportsman," he told Grosvenor Casino.
"You get that opportunity, and you have a father who has been so successful, it would have been a very important part of his development at that time. But Mick never had that unfortunately. He just had that relationship up until the skiing accident. All the pressures were on Mick’s shoulders just because of the name that he had.
"Michael would have loved the opportunity to work with his son to try to put all his experiences into enabling Mick to be a very different character to what we have seen. Because he was alone in his F1 career. Michael would have been a big help and that father son relationship would have been a very beneficial thing for Mick.
"In other ways, it would have been a wonderful experience for Michael to have that deep relationship with his son. Sadly, that was something we didn't see. There's all the positives of the past knowing what he achieved in F1 and now we just have memories. It would be lovely just to have Michael back now."