The announcement about Lewis Hamilton’s move to Mercedes gave us no insight at all into how things unfolded with Michael Schumacher – and there is no mention either of retirement plans or a future role with the company.
The only conclusion we can draw is that Schumacher was shown the door – and possibly the very future of the team depended upon Hamilton’s arrival.
The fact that Niki Lauda has been announced as a non-executive chairman of the team suggests that there is no room for Michael in any kind of management role.
It seems that Michael is keen to carry on somewhere else, and he has been linked to Sauber – although an Esteban Gutierrez/Jaime Alguersuari line-up is being mooted for the Swiss team.
In the Mercedes release Schumacher said only: “I have had three nice years with the team which unfortunately did not go as well as we all would have wanted on the sporting side. I wish Lewis well and for the team to achieve the success we worked so hard for in the build-up. I would like to thank the team for their trust and all the guys for their unconditional commitment. I will now concentrate on the next races.”
Meanwhile the management chose its words very carefully.
“I would first of all like to thank Michael Schumacher for the important contribution he has made to the growth of our team over the past three seasons,” said Ross Brawn. “His energy and commitment have never wavered, even when results have not matched our own expectations, and we are determined to finish the 2012 season together on a high. As always, it has been a pleasure to work with Michael.”
“Of course, it takes a great driver to replace such a legendary and successful one as Michael Schumacher,” said Norbert Haug. “Over the past three years, Michael has been a great driver and an exemplary ambassador for MERCEDES AMG PETRONAS.
“His experience has been an important factor in guiding the development of our team in Brackley and we extend our sincere thanks to Michael for his loyalty, team play and commitment. We will be working very hard together in order to achieve the best possible results in the remainder of the 2012 season.”
Adam Cooper F1 
Esteban Gutierrez would be good I think. I like what I’ve seen of him in GP2. Not sure on Schumacher, there’s no indication of where he’ll go. I do keep looking at the Massa seat and wondering why Ferrari are taking so long to confirm that though, it makes me think they have irons in the fire, is Schumacher one of those? Get him in for a swansong year before Seb joins?
Gutierrez has been a bit unconvincing against Colado this year, but Sauber would be a perfect starting point. GP2 seems to be a bit hit and miss now a days having been diluted by WSR 3.5.
Is it me or have Mercedes handled this really badly?
Pity they couldn’t bring themselves to apologise to him for the most unreliable car on the grid and for wasting his time for the last two and a half years while he worked as hard as ever for them. I hope at least he doesn’t stay with them with some ‘team’ job.
Looking on the bright side, there are still drives available in cars that have out raced the Mercedes this year, if thats what he wants to do.
Not a nice way to treat Schumi, I agree. Especially considering that Brawn booted him out of ferrari for raikkonen.
Poor Nico Rosberg… Shafted once again. He was team leader right? So that was ‘his’ car that Michael took from him (and Nico’s race number) when he came in, unannounced, in 2009 – only to do nothing with it since then. Now Rosberg’s got to support Lewis, and if history goes to prove, Ross only favours his ‘No.1’ driver with the trick bits, just ask Rubens…. If I was him I’d be talking to Ferrari or Sauber – now – PDQ!
Michael deserved so much better. He’s shown his better than Nico this year (when the car has actually worked) really think he’s been treated badly and it’s a horrible way to got out.
Sorry, me again!
Last night on the F1 show on Sky there was an interview with Martin and Ross. Martin talks the talk very well and seemed genuine, Ross, on the other hand looked very uncomfortable and kept quoting the press release, no eye contact and strange body language, he said at one point that “Michael was really happy with the way things had turned out” really happy seems a strange turn of phrase when you look at how Michael was looking at Singapore but then, that could have had to do with hoping the car was going to be slightly better with the first upgrade since Monaco and finding that it wasn’t.
Herr Dieter Zetche said that they had “had fun” with Michael, perhaps that was lost in translation! I don’t think Michael has been having fun and must have been endlessly frustrated by the lack of development and progress.
How nice it would be for Michael to have a farewell season with Sauber so that we can say goodbye properly.
[end of rant]