Ferrari F1’s Sporting Director Reveals When Mick Schumacher May Get His FP1 Chance

Mick Schumacher was so close, yet so far to his maiden F1 outing. The young German had been training for a while to make his debut appearance during the first practice session at the Eifel Grand Prix.

Unfortunately for him, bad weather conditions forced the FIA to scrap the session. What’s more, with the season soon coming to a close and with a number of new circuits being introduced, Mick was apprehensive about his next chance coming this year.

However, Ferrari’s Sporting Director Laurent Mekies has provided Mick (and F1 fans) with a glimmer of hope. The same holds true even for Callum Ilott as he was supposed to get a run-out with Haas during the same weekend as Schumacher.

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He said, “With new tracks, nobody has been there. We try to be fair and reasonable with our partners. I don’t think it will be (fair) to run them on completely new tracks, where nobody has any data.

“And because they are going to race in Bahrain (in the F2 championship), we don’t want to disturb them as they are fighting for the title. So the only chance is Abu Dhabi.

“We’ll be discussing with both Alfa Romeo and Haas to see what is possible. We will be trying very hard to give them that chance.”

Young Driver test coming up, but Mick Schumacher would be focused on winning F2 title

Following the culmination of the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, there will be a Young Driver Test. Mick will be involved alongside the other upcoming F2 hotshots. While Mekies or even Schumacher might not consider this a problem. Dr. Helmut Marko, Red Bull’s Motorsport Advisor, does.

Dr. Marko thinks that letting Schumacher run in FP1 in Abu Dhabi could adversely affect his preparation for the aforementioned test. However, the test won’t deter the focus of the 21-year-old.

Schumacher sits atop the points table with 191 points, 22 points ahead of the second-placed Ilott. A championship title would all but guarantee Schumacher’s promotion to F1.

With 6 races to go (3 features and 3 sprints), Mick would want to seal the title as early as possible.

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