There’ll be a multitude of reasons for which Michael Schumacher is regarded in the Formula 1 world and the world off it and big stats is just one of them.
Because if statistical achievements are the key driver of success, then in Michael Schumacher’s ebb rest some envy-inspiring ones.
No other driver besides Sir Lewis Hamilton has bagged seven world titles. Michael Schumacher was the first man to get to that astonishing feat.
Schumacher is the first driver to go past 90 Formula 1 wins; the German ending with 91 against his name.
In so doing, he ended only nine shy of what would’ve been a deserving century of Grand Prix victories, that staggering feat now resting with Lewis.
With 155 podiums and 77 fastest laps and five back-to-back driver titles with Ferrari, the prime force of Formula 1 racing, Schumacher blazed a trail for others
to follow.
In some ways, he must be content with the fact that there did emerge one man from his own land, who all but neared his dazzling achievements.
Truth be told, Sebastian Vettel’s four world titles on the trot with Red Bull nearly matched Schumacher’s five with Ferrari. That Schumacher remains ahead
in the game and perhaps even so, the curve is fair and just.
There’ve been many who’ve won a Formula 1 World title but Michael Schumacher’s instinct for domination was simply incomparable. Fast as also furious,
impeccable in car control as also intuitive, there haven’t been many who’ve given such authoritative and precise feedback to team’s engineers on the aspect
of car handling as the great Michael Schumacher.
But to move away from the dazzling numerical feats, the Hurth-born F1 wiz emerged as a model figure for what constitutes a true athlete for which he must be
credited. Though seldom does he get credit for that; the world seems to constantly marvel only at the seven titles.
In reality, Michael Schumacher isn’t just a world champion but a brand ambassador of longevity. That’s down to the fact that the man who turns 54 today contested
in sixteen back-to-back seasons in the top tier of motorsport before taking to the wheels of an F1 car from the onset of 2010 until 2012, which is when he finally
called it quits.
But in the years that Schumacher drove an F1 machine, and he did so with usual self confidence, he brought an inexplicable sense of exhilaration to the sport.
It’s a priceless quality that emboldened Germany’s presence in F1 and in turn, extended F1’s appeal to the globetrotting fan who doesn’t think much before
leaving his or her comfort zone to be part of a live sporting event.
There are drivers who’ve won at Spa, enthralled at Interlagos, dominated at Donington Park and added to the gravitas of Monaco and Montreal. But there aren’t
many like Michael Schumacher who became the adjective of Formula 1.
And that’s actually the truth; it was through Schumacher’s mind-boggling racing skills and feats that the nineties world of F1 became known as the Schumacher-era.
May that never change.
That the likes of Mika Hakkinen, and later, Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen took it upon themselves to stand up to Schumacher’s supremacy was in itself, a tribute
to a blossoming world champion.
And that is what the 2000s produced: the live wire of contests that one saw between the imperious pace of Schumacher’s Ferrari and the wildly fast McLarens
and Renaults.
While surely the seasons from the onset of 2000 until 2005 should be remembered for the mercurial talent of Kimi and Fernando, what mustn’t be forgotten is that
the rising forces of the sport were up against a man who was several years their senior in what became a classic case of the master challenging the might of a
worthy pupil.
Definitely, the world would’ve been an even dearer place with the young Mick Schumcher sitting in a highly sophisticated F1 machine of the contemporary era
with the warmth and support of his incredible, record-shattering father Michael but then, life’s not ideal always for it’s never meant to be that way.
And maybe if there was ever some motivation that Mick needed to push himself to go out there and gather a drive in F1 again could well be down to his famous
father being there and yet, not being fully there in the first place.
Yet, what one can’t aptly describe is the endless sense of happiness the sporting world would get from the scene of a Mick Schumacher victory with father Michael
behind.
It’s something the likes of Jos and Max Verstappen have already experienced and on countless occasions.
That said, if one were to think just why there’s so much passion in the sentiment echoed by three simple words, “Keep Fighting Michael,”
maybe it’s also down to the fact that it’s precisely what Germany’s most extravagant talent in F1 epitomised: fighting spirit, what else!
So keep fighting Michael, we sense your pain but we urge you to continue battling.