A further hint that Michael Schumacher could be considering retirement at the end of the season came ahead of qualifying for the Turkish Grand Prix on Saturday, when it transpired that the German had asked for the Grand Prix Drivers' Association elections to be postponed.


The ballot had been due to take place ahead of the next round of the championship, at Monza on 10 September, but it is understood that Schumacher, a GPDA director, has requested that they be delayed until after the race. Monza has long been the date at which Ferrari maintains it will reveal its line-up for 2007, and paddock wisdom suggests that a lot could hinge on Schumacher's position in the championship.


While the F1 world appears divided over whether the German will call it quits at the end of this year or next, his manager, Willi Weber, has urged Schumacher to go out on top, logically on the back of an eighth world title - something which is becoming a distinct possibility this year. Should Schumi decide that enough is enough, he would have to stand down from his position within the GPDA, but is likely to seek re-election should he opt to continue, giving yesterday's request greater meaning.

Massa triumphed by 5.5sec for Ferrari from Renault's Alonso who had to fight off seven-times champion Schumacher several times over the last 15 laps to take a vital second place by just a car's length.


The Spaniard came home just fractions ahead of his Ferrari rival to increase his championship lead over the German to 12 points with four races left. Massa, who had started on pole for the first time, claimed his historic win in his 66th race and his first season with Ferrari.

"It's just fantastic. I've worked so hard my whole career for this moment," said a tearful Massa. "I'm full of emotion, like yesterday (when he took pole). This is my first time, it's like a dream come true."

Alonso admitted:

"Felipe was impossible to catch. We'll just need to do something for the next race."

Schumacher, meanwhile, paid tribute to his young team mate:

"Congratulations to Felipe - he did a superb job. There was quite a gap and he was consistent and drove superbly.

"That's what is good about our team - somebody might not have had a good weekend and the other makes up for it. It was a nice fight towards the end."

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Formula 1's summer break is coming to an end. On Wednesday Michael Schumacher will be heading to Istanbul for the Grand Prix of Turkey. On the way he will make a stop in Athens.

On the 25th anniversary of the National Drivers' soccer team, the Italian squad that competes in charity games and of which Michael is a part, will play in Greece for the first time. The game will kick off at 21.00 at the Stadio Karaiskaki and will be against a Greek all-star team. It will be 'a great premiere' as Michael stated.



From Thursday on the focus will shift to the next round of the Formula 1 Grand Prix championship.

"This is how things should be", he smiled. The German champion is looking forward to his latest challenge. "We have had a few days off and, naturally, I had a pleasant time. However, I could have done without it as it would have been better to go straight into the Grand Prix of Turkey after Hungary. The title challenge is so exciting that I cannot wait for the next race. The Istanbul weekend is finally about to get underway".

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In the aftermath of Ayrton Senna’s shocking 1994 death at Imola's infamous Tamburello corner while leading the San Marino GP, the F1 fraternity was shaken to its core. Once again new technical regulations were imposed to slow the cars and improve driver safety, but even with the first driver fatalities in a dozen years, the show went on, as it always has.

The beginning of the current era in Formula One is marked by a single day: 1 May 1994.
But once again, the roots of the transition reach back further, to the 1991 Belgian GP at Spa, where young German Michael Schumacher burst onto the F1 scene by qualifying 7th in his first Formula One start for Team Jordan, moving on just one race later to Benetton. With the absence of Mansell and the now-retired Prost from F1 for the 1994 season, there was only Schumacher to take on Ayrton Senna and make the new F1 cars — running under revised FIA specifications once again, designed to encourage more competition between drivers rather then between money and computers — a true test of driver mettle.



And new the cars were. After focusing on their active components for years, F1 designers were hard pressed to meet the new specifications, and most of the paddock was not delivered in time for much winter testing before the season's first race at Interlagos in Brazil. As Senna prophetically told a pre-season interviewer,

"It's going to be a season with lots of accidents, and I'll risk saying that we'll be lucky if something really serious doesn't happen."

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Reigning champion Fernando Alonso will take a 10-point lead over Schumacher into the next round of the season - the Turkish Grand Prix on August 27th.


Alonso is eagerly awaiting his second trip to the Istanbul Circuit, where he will hope to consolidate his championship lead.

"Yes, it feels more like Spa or a very old circuit, so it is something more than normal corners. It is very wide, so good opportunities to overtake, but apart from this, I think there are some corners that you cannot see the exits from, some corners that are really difficult. This turn eight, really a long corner, left corner. But with the V8 (engine) this year will be probably flat (out/full speed) and with four or four and a half g-force. So, it's something special this race."

said Fernando Alonso, F1 world champion.


Alonso won six of the first nine rounds of the season and finished second in the other three races.


A haul of just 16 points have followed in the last four races though and the 25-year-old has welcomed a chance to recharge his batteries in the three-week break that follows the Hungarian Grand Prix.

"All the breaks and stops are welcome, not only for the race drivers, but in general. I believe that the three weeks we have before Turkey is great for the mechanics, the engineers and the drivers. We can have a bit of a rest and think about what to do in the second half of this championship."

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