Neither Lewis Hamilton nor Max Verstappen, Michael Schumacher’s Astonishing “Awareness” Compared to F1 Star’s Unique Talent

Contrary to popular belief, F1 drivers are just benchmarked on how fast they can go around a circuit. Well, at the end of the day, the stopwatch never lies and is king. However, putting in a quick lap time is one thing, and finishing the race faster than your rivals is another. That’s exactly why, the greats of this sport, like Michael Schumacher, have that distinguishable quality the others don’t possess.

This sport has been lucky to witness only the crème de la crème of motorsport in its illustrious history. But that only speaks volumes of the men who have been able to carve a niche out for themselves here. But what was it that made them so special?

Which F1 driver is most like Michael Schumacher?

The word ‘awareness’ gets thrown around in this sport quite a lot. A driver can be pacey. But what the teams look for is the racing acumen they have which gets translated into awareness. But what exactly does this mean? And who’s the driver on the current grid who’s got what Schumacher had? Spoiler alert, it’s neither Lewis Hamilton nor Max Verstappen!

On a recent episode of the F1 Nation podcast, 1996 F1 champion, Damon Hill tried to explain. He said, “I think it’s the extra capacity they have to take in other things. So, they can take on board what other people’s lap times are, what the weather’s doing, what the track changes/conditions are, whether they need to communicate that to their engineer.”

He concluded, “And I think that Michael Schumacher was very good at that. George Russell’s very good at that.” 

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It’s been a year-and-a-half since Russell and Lewis Hamilton have been teammates. But who has edged out the other till now?

Russell v. Hamilton; head-to-head

In 2022, the young Brit clearly had the measure of his 7x champion teammate. However, slowly and steadily, the tide seems to be changing in Hamilton’s favor. But if we were to stack the duo up in 2023, who gets out on top?

According to Sky Sports, “The battle between Hamilton and Russell is the closest on the grid, with little to split the British team-mates. Russell has the slight upper hand in qualifying but Hamilton is coming back having out-qualified his team-mate in both Monaco and Spain.”

“And Hamilton is stretching ahead of Russell on Sundays, but both of them finishing on the podium in Barcelona helped Mercedes move above Aston Martin into second in the Constructors’ Championship.” [as things stood before the Canadian GP]

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Will George Russell go down in the annals of F1 history alongside the likes of Schumacher, Senna and Hamilton?