Last week we looked into the debut and the years at Benetton of Michael Schumacher. Now we continue with his first years driving for Ferrari. If you missed the previous post about Schumacher's career, you can find it here:
Career highlight: Michael Schumacher part 1
The move to Ferrari
After two world championships with Benetton, Schumacher joined Ferrari in 1996. In the first year with the Italian team Michael was suffering from a lot of reliability issues with the car, resulting in a DNF in 7 out of 16 races. In 1996 he also had some successes. He managed to win 3 races, which was more than Ferrari had won in the seasons 1991-1995.
One race in particular, that year's very wet Spanish Grand Prix is worth taking a closer look at. During this race what in retrospect was one of his best races ever, he lapped the entire field up to third place. In lap 19 he took the lead and from that point on he lapped 5 seconds a lap faster than all the other drivers. At the end he scored his first win for Ferrari that weekend.
The battle with Villeneuve
In 1997 Schumacher competed with Jacques Villeneuve for the title. In the beginning of the season Villeneuve won 3 out of the first 6 races, while Schumacher was only able to win 1 race. After 6 races Jacques led the championship with 3 points. In the next races Schumacher would take the lead in the championship, only to give it back to Villeneuve after the round 15, the Luxembourg Grand Prix where Schumacher had a DNF and Villeneuve winning the race. One race later Schumacher was back in the lead after winning the Japanese Grand Prix. Villeneuve didn’t score a point due to disqualification.
Arriving at the last round of the championship Schumacher led the championship with 1 point. In the last stage of the race Schumacher suffered some technical issues from the car and lost performance from the car. In lap 48 Villeneuve was trying to pass Schumacher, on which he steered into Villeneuve, retiring himself from the race. Villeneuve managed to score 4 point and won the championship that year. Two weeks after the race Michael Schumacher was disqualified from the entire 1997 world championship.
A new rival is appearing
In the 1998 season, Schumacher would again drive for the championship but his rival this year was Mika Häkkinen. Häkkinen started the season with two wins, gaining a 16 points lead over Schumacher. The third race of the season, the Argentine Grand Prix was Schumacher’s first win of the season, but it would take 4 races for Schumacher to win another race. The next win wouldn’t take that long, Michael won 3 races in a row; the Canadian Grand Prix, the French Grand Prix and British Grand Prix. Later in the season Schumacher won two other races, but it wasn’t enough to win the championship. Häkkinen won the title with a 14 point lead over Schumacher. Häkkinen’s team McLaren won the constructor championship with 23 point more than Ferrari.
The start of the 1999 season started off again with Häkkinen as Michael’s main rival. Schumacher started with a 8th place in Australia, a 2nd place in Brazil and after a win during the San Marino Grand Prix he was first in the championship. Schumacher hold on to the first place until the Canadian Gran Prix, where he spun off and couldn’t finish the race. Two races later during the British Grand Prix fate struck and Schumacher broke his leg during a crash in Stowe Corner. Mika Salo replaced Michael and he wouldn't return until the last 2 races of the season. Schumacher finished 5th in the championship, but he was able to help Ferrari win the constructor championship.
In a few weeks we’ll continue with his championships years at Ferrari, his retirement and his comeback at Mercedes.