Mick Schumacher hopes the fickle weather in the Eifel mountains won’t impact his first Formula 1 practice session at the Nurburgring.
The German, who currently leads the F2 championship, will be replacing Antonio Giovinazzi for the first 90 minutes of running on Friday amid ever-increasing speculation that he’ll be announced as the Italian’s replacement for 2021.
For Schumacher, this will mark just his third outing in modern F1 machinery following his 2019 test in Bahrain and a run in the 2018 Ferrari at Fiorano last week.
But with plenty of attention on how he gets on, Mick hopes the skies will allow him to show what he can do.
“Currently it looks like it is going to be wet,” Schumacher told RTL. “I think every time I tested a new car, it was always wet. Always!
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“We need to see if we are able to drive first, unfortunately F1 teams only get a limited amount of tyres to use.
“Hopefully it won‘t be too wet so that we can drive at least a little bit. Otherwise, it is more waiting than driving. Hopefully we can do some laps.
“I have a lot of respect for it [the FP1 outing]. It is the first time driving in front of all team principals, bosses, CEOs, in front of all teams.
“I will try to do what I can, show what I know and concentrate on myself, trying to do my very best.
“I will try to give the team as much as data as possible because it is a race weekend for them.”
His appearance is of course bringing back memories of the five wins his father, the seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher, enjoyed at the Nurburgring.
And only comes a few weeks after Mick got to drive the 2004 Ferrari which Schumi Sr won his final F1 title in at Mugello.
“To see him in his father’s car, on that day, on that weekend was sort of surreal,” Sebastian Vettel said.
“I really like him as well. He is just a nice young man. Knowing who his father was and knowing what his father was to me, it was very special.
“Certainly the situation as it is now is very difficult for him but I think he is coping with it in a very mature way, which you wouldn’t expect from a man that is just a bit over 20.”