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Ferrari has officially announced the end of its relationship with Mick Schumacher, who is now expected to take on a reserve role at the Mercedes Formula 1 team.
The split had been expected for several months, though neither party would openly discuss it.
Ferrari took Schumacher – whose father Michael won five of his seven F1 world championships with the team – under its wing in 2019.
It supported him through his two seasons in Formula 2, culminating in his 2020 title, gave him F1 testing mileage in both current and older machinery plus with its customer teams as part of its Driver Academy programme, and paved the way for his 2021 Haas race seat.
But Schumacher has been dropped by Haas for 2023 in favour of Nico Hulkenberg, after a season in which his first F1 points were accompanied by too many crashes and doubts over his ultimate pace.
“Scuderia Ferrari thanks Mick for these four years and the many kilometres covered together, and wishes him all the best for the future,” said a Ferrari statement.
Schumacher was announced as a reserve for Mercedes for 2023 shortly after his split from Ferrari was confirmed.
Its team principal Toto Wolff said last month that Schumacher “just fits and now we need to make it happen”, emphasising that no deal was in place but saying “if he wants to, if Sabine [Kehm, manager] wants to, then we’ll see where it goes”.
Mercedes is another team with long-standing Schumacher family ties, having given Michael his first major career break in sportscars in the 1990s then enticed him into an F1 comeback when it launched its current works team for 2010.
“Mick is someone that has always been close to our heart, because of Michael, and the whole Schumacher family, Ralf was in the DTM for a long time with us, his son [David] races Mercedes in GTs,” Wolff added.
“And he [Mick] is an intelligent, well-mannered young man, he’s been very successful in junior formulas, we believe that we can look after him if the situation were to happen, with someone that just fits the team.”
Mercedes had previously had its Formula E drivers Nyck de Vries and Stoffel Vandoorne as reserves, but De Vries has secured an AlphaTauri F1 race seat for 2023 and Mercedes’ FE exit has led to Vandoorne joining DS Penske in the electric series while also becoming Aston Martin’s main F1 reserve following Hulkenberg’s switch to Haas.
Mercedes had also discussed a reserve deal with Daniel Ricciardo before he chose to take up a position at Red Bull instead.
Ferrari split doomed Schumacher at Haas
Last month when Haas announced its decision to part with Schumacher, Ben Anderson argued that only Ferrari’s continuing backing might have saved his drive. Here’s an extract from that column:
The Schumacher name seems simultaneously to be a blessing and a curse.
Mick’s former Formula 3 rival Dan Ticktum became convinced that year of a conspiracy that Schumacher was favoured with better Mercedes engines because of who he was, while on the other hand Schumacher’s former Haas Formula 1 team-mate Nikita Mazepin said the family went to great lengths to prevent Mick receiving favourable treatment when they were karting team-mates.
In any case, that name comes with a certain degree of attention, expectation and added pressure to succeed. How could it not when your dad is an icon and one of the most decorated F1 drivers in history?
There was always this suspicion Ferrari selected Schumacher Jr for its driver academy at least partly out of some degree of emotional loyalty to Michael, rather than because Mick was outright good enough – but in fairness, the team always said he would need to prove himself worthy in order to progress, regardless of who his dad is.
In 2022 that progression wasn’t consistent, or impressive enough. Schumacher is decently fast, as well as a little erratic and crash-prone, but basically and ultimately unreliable – a driver Haas feels it can’t rely on to deliver at the right time in the marginal scenarios the team usually operates in, even at its best.
Guenther Steiner clearly had doubts very early in 2022. As early as Baku, in June, Schumacher was being asked to raise his level. That’s not what a driver angling for a contract extension wants to hear, and it’s certainly not what you expect for a driver who might one day race for the Scuderia.
Once it became clear – around the time of F1’s August break – that Ferrari was likely to drop Schumacher from its academy, Haas had no reason to do any favours for its engine supplier by persevering with someone it clearly felt was an unconvincing prospect.
