Statistically,
Michael Schumacher is the greatest Formula 1 driver ever. Though the
Ferrari domination days were not a very exciting spectacle, and though his return to
Mercedes was a little underwhelming, I respected that I was watching a living legend. He had many high points, a his fair share of controversial low points too. I'm a bit late with this, but to celebrate his 50th birthday, I wanted to post some of my favourite Schumacher models (as there's not enough room to post them all) and celebrate some of his F1 achievements that have been faithfully reproduced .
1991 Jordan 191 Ford - debut at Belgian Grand Prix
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| Minichamps 433910032 |
Perhaps one of the most beautiful and elegant Formula 1 cars ever, the Jordan 191. It was Jordan's first year in the sport, and when regular Belgian driver was jailed prior to the his home race, Jordan searched for a driver with funds for his cash-strapped team. Along came Mercedes-backed Schumacher. Whilst much of the story in the build up to the weekend was about their imprisoned driver, the after qualifying was about the debutante who qualified 8th (promoted to 7th on the starting grid) and ahead of his team-mate. Sadly, the clutch failed before he got to Eau Rouge (and Radillion).
It was enough for Bernie to take an interest from a commercial aspect to move him to a top team, and
Benetton team boss Flavio Briatore saw a cheap driver who was clearly very fast to invest in and begin to build his team around, and a move away from Jordan was engineered as soon as the next race as Eddie Jordan had not tied Schumacher down to a contract.
Minichamps released an updated model in 2011, appearing in this limited edition model and also in the 20 years since his debut alongside the
Mercedes W02 (see below).
Score 8/10
1992 Benetton B192 Ford - first win at Belgian Grand Prix
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| Minichamps - 517924318 |
In the last couple of years, Minichamps released a resin version of the B192, and in the 25th Anniversary Collection, Schumacher has his arm raised as he crossed the line in victory. This is a stunningly accurate and beautiful model and so gets high marks from me.
Score 9/10
1993 Benetton B193 Ford - Portuguese Grand Prix
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| Spark S4774 |
In 1993, Schumacher was a regular podium visitor, but his only visit to the top step came in Portugal.
Spark released their nice version of this car around 2015. Spark's disappointing proportions take away from the nice detail they've added, so a pretty average score I'm afraid.
Score 7/10
1994 Benetton B194 Ford - First World Championship
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| Minichamps 447941605 |
I have written a separate
blog post with many versions of the B194 in and a bit more of the story behind the season. For all the controversy surrounding that season, Schumacher was the stand-out driver over the course of 1994 - his drive at Spain, whilst stuck in 5th gear, in particular was truly special.
The most recent model from Minichamps in my collection is of the Australian Grand Prix model, a resin remake of the B194 and it is a beaut.
Score 9/10
1995 Benetton B195 Renault - Second World Championship
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| Minichamps 431952701 |
Benetton secured the standard setting Renault engines by the craftiest of means.
Williams had blocked Benetton securing Renault engines to maintain their advantage, but Ligier also ran the Renault engines. Briatore saw an opportunity to buy the
Ligier team and then transfer the engine deal across to Benetton, genius! The result was that the 1995 Ligier looked nearly identical to the B195, but the Benetton was a great car. Williams had also produced a great car, but their drivers made too many mistakes, whilst Schumacher dominated with 9 wins from 17 races.
Though Minichamps have re-released this model a few times in recent years, and Spark have released their version too, my favourite is still this original one, the
Alesi taxi version from the Canadian Grand Prix.
Score 7/10
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| Minichamps 510964311 |
Schumacher moved to Ferrari in 1996, but it would take several years before he would be winning championships again. The F310 was not a great car, it was even nicknamed 'the truck'. Yet Schumacher managed 3 victories, in a class by himself in the wet in Spain, a glorious victory in front of the Tifosi in Italy and an opportunistic win at Belgium where Williams messed up their pit strategy behind the safety car.
I liked the bolted on high-nose conversion that appeared from the Canadian Grand Prix onwards, but it's the Spanish Grand Prix model by Minichamps that I want to put here. It was a very rare model for many years and commanded quite high prices, but I managed to snatch a bargain price for this one.
Score 7/10
1997 - 1999 Ferrari F310B, F300 and F399
In 1997, Schumacher famously crashed into
Villeneuve and earned a disqualification from the Championship, ruining a great campaign in a car that was clearly 2nd best and showing many fantastic drives such as Monaco and Belgium.
In 1998,
McLaren were so far ahead, thanks to the new regulations and the arrival of Adrian Newey, and Schumacher did wonders to make a fight out of it. The win in Hungary stands out, as well as finishing the British Grand Prix in the pit-lane.
In 1999, Schumacher had a brake failure on the first lap of the British Grand Prix and broke his leg, ending his Championship hopes. Had that not happened, he would surely have been champion.
Hot Wheels (
Mattel) took over an exclusive model making contract in 1999, but their mass-produced, budget cars lacked the quality of its rivals. But there were two models, both from the 1998 season by Minichamps, that I quite liked, the black test car, and the '
tower wing' version.
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| Minichamps 510984300 |
A nice model from Minichamps.
Score 7/10
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| Minichamps 510984333 |
I'm trying to be objective and not be swayed by the ugly tower wing, so I'll stick with the same score.
Score 7/10
The battles with
Hakkinen in 2000 were intense and fantastic to watch and when Schumacher won the race in Japan, with three years of missing out on the championship fresh in mind, he clinched his first Championship at Ferrari, who themselves had not won a Driver's Championship since 1979. The Japanese Grand Prix was flat out all the way through, both drivers and teams pushing to the peak of their abilities, and on that day, Schumacher clinched the race and the title. For the next 4 seasons, Schumacher and Ferrari and Bridgestone dominated Formula 1 and records began to tumble.
I've grouped these together because the models by Hot Wheels were not particularly great. Not even those that were released under the 'Mattel Elite' series made much improvement. But at least they made an effort with some special releases, this of the 2000-2002 series of cars with arms raised and dirty cars remains in my collection today.
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| Hot Wheels B7022 |
Score 6/10
The 2003 and 2004 cars are the standard cars.
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| Hot Wheels B1018 |
Score 6/10
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| Hot Wheels B6206 |
Score 6/10
For 2005, the FIA had so set the regulations that it favoured Ferrari's rivals, and in particular, the Michelin tyres ran by their main competitors. Shockingly, Ferrari were a mid-field team for 2005, and only have one race win that season at the USA Grand Prix due to a problem with the Michelin tyres forcing all their cars to withdraw from running the race. In 2006, Schumacher and Ferrari competed for victories again, though Renault still had the faster car.
Schumacher retired at the end of the season, and produced a fantastic drive at his final race in Brazil where he fought his way back through the field after starting 10th, then had a puncture battling with
Fisichella, and then fighting through the field to finish in 4th place.
Again, these are the standard Hot Wheel cars for 2005 and 2006. There are slight improvements from the earlier Ferrari models, but if you compare them with the Minichamps cars of the same era, I can't score it any higher.
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| Hot Wheels G9731 |
Score 6/10
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| Hot Wheels J2967 |
Score 6/10
When
Felipe Massa was injured at the Hungarian Grand Prix in 2009, Schumacher was keen to substitute for him, but for neck problems to put a halt to it. Brawn, who had been with Schumacher at Benetton and Ferrari, took the opportunity to sign the German to a three year deal at Mercedes. The 2009 World Champions did not have the finances nor the infrastructure to compete in these three years, and they were largely building years that laid the foundations for the current Mercedes domination.
Schumacher did not beat
Rosberg in overall points and mistakes came too often that had looked to tarnish Schumacher's reputation. However in hindsight, Rosberg was close to Hamilton in pace and even beat him to a World Championship, so Rosberg was a quick driver, if not a little under-rated. Schumacher had days he would demonstrate his old pace and was at times a match for Rosberg, like qualifying fastest in the 2012 Monaco GP and a podium finish at the European Grand Prix, but he was nowhere near as consistent as he was in the first part of his career. But I appreciated that he came back, that even though these were no longer his glory days, he was a living legend nonetheless and at times there were 5 World Champion on the grid (Schumacher,
Alonso,
Hamilton,
Button &
Vettel).
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| Minichamps 410100003 |
Minichamps added to the Michael Schumacher Collection, but they also released a number of special versions. The 2010 car here is with Mercedes packaging.
Score 8/10
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| Minichamps 412912011 |
In 2011, they released a Spa special with a 2 car set, one from his debut 20 years previous, and his 2011 car with the golden helmet he wore for that race.
Score 8/10
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| Minichamps 410120407 |
In 2012, Minichamps released his final Grand Prix where he took a flag around on his final tour, with 'Thank you, Goodbye Michael' on the car.
Score 8/10
