Just unraveled an article from the Press Association concerning Damon Hill's view on Michael Schumacher's fitness and future in F1. Enjoy. Damon Hill believes old adversary Michael Schumacher will need to pull out all the stops this year if he is to prove himself worthy of a new deal with Mercedes.Schumacher is now into the final year of a three-season contract he signed with the German manufacturer upon his return to Formula One at the start of 2010 after three years in retirement.Assessing the battle and year ahead for Schumacher, Hill told Press Association Sport: "It's unbelievable he's still going, whilst I've been retired for 12 years. He's an extraordinary performer who clearly loves his driving and doesn't want to stop. I can understand that. But Formula One cannot carry people along if they are not doing their bit." There is no guarantee the 43-year-old will even want to continue beyond this season, but if he does 1996 world champion Hill knows he cannot afford to languish again behind team-mate Nico Rosberg.In 2010 Schumacher finished 70 points adrift of Rosberg, although last year he closed that gap down to 13 as he showed glimpses of the driver that made him a seven-time champion.Hill added: "He's going to have to fight with everything he's got to keep going for another year, or beyond this one."As far as Hill is concerned, with the 51-year-old due to become an expert F1 summariser for Sky Sports for this season, it will all boil down to Schumacher versus Rosberg."First of all he has to prove he is quicker than his team-mate," added Hill. "Of course, the contribution a guy like Michael can make is enormous because of his experience, but eventually it really comes down to whether you are the quickest guy in the team."The competition in Formula One is not just driver against driver across all the teams, it is intensely between the two drivers in the same team."Your career will depend on how you compare, so in a sense Nico would do better to have some comparison with a more contemporary driver because people are not sure of the pace Michael now has." Copyright © 2012 The Press Association. All rights reserved. please log in to view this image
Schumi should have shown Hill more respect when they raced. Whilst Schumi has been a disaster on his return (since he no longer calls teh shots like he did at Ferrari), Hill's performances for Arrows and Jordan were remarkable considering the cars were well behind the top ones. He won for Jordan and famously very nearly did for Arrows in Hungary. And what about his every now and then very good qualifying ; for some reason I remember him qualifying 4th at Jerez just 0.007 seconds behind the top 3 who all posted the same time. That was the race where Schumi tried to run JV offf the road. Hill also had the sense to realise when he could no longer cut it and left. If SChumi suddenly starts performing, most folk will say its the car. Schumi has nothing to gain by staying.
tbh teng how many of us didn't respect Hill until he left Williams and proved he'd been a worthy champion after all.
Hahaha, I will stay well out of it, I only put the damn thread up to read-not to start a fight again. I do think Damon has a point though, Michael and Nico battles in 2012 are going to get fiery.. Nico does qualify higher than Michael, but Michael has flaming starts, compared to the last two years they are going to be closer than ever.
I think that Mercedes at the moment are in real danger of stagnating and I include Rosberg in my reasoning for that. Since he left Williams Rosberg hasn't in my view looked quite as quick as he used to; certainly I don't really get the feeling any more that he's outdriving a slow car. Nevertheless, I think that Schumacher might get a couple of podiums, maybe even another victory this year. But if Mercedes want to progress long-term they should look at putting someone in the car who will get them podiums consistently. If I'm honest I think that'll mean they will have to give up on the all-German driver outlook which they have at the moment. Incidentally I can maybe see Hamilton taking over from Schumacher, but that's a discussion for another time.
Two of the stronger rumours for Mercedes are Hamilton and di Resta so ironically they could go from all German to all British That said I can't see Hamilton leaving McLaren any time soon, but I'm in danger of really dragging us off on a tangent here.
