I often wonder what headline will be my sports story of the year, what incident, what event? Today without a doubt I got the headline, the event and the incident … the return of the great Michael Schumacher to Formula One. Schumacher is statistically the greatest driver in the history of the sport and, maybe along with Senna, my favorite driver of all time. I grew up watching Schumacher, I had his hat, Ferrari t-shirts, his sunglasses and a huge Ferrari flag growing up and in August 2000 I lived my dream of getting to see an F1 race in person and most importantly, Schumacher. I truly believed that if you hadn’t seen Schumacher in person before now then your chance had gone, until today.

I have to admit, joy came over me fast when my brother sent me a text message that the strong rumor was now confirmed but I quickly got a hold of myself when I reminded myself the circumstances of his comeback. It is not the most joyous of occasions given the injuries to Felippe Massa, but nonetheless it is going to be a lot of fun to watch. For how long Schumacher is back remains to be seen, it could be a few races, it could be the rest of the season, it depends on the health of Massa so we’ll have to enjoy this little event while we can and also wish a speedy recovery to Massa. Of course there is the other talk that the adrenaline rush of being back behind the wheel might grab hold of Schumacher once again and drag him back into the sport for another season next year, though realistically they would have to be at the expense of Massa or Raikkonen at Ferrari, but we’re getting ahead of ourselves here.

So how will he do?

Well that’s anyones guess, but I don’t think he’ll embarrass himself. The only catch is that with mid-season testing bans in place Schumi will not get the chance to get behind the wheel of the Ferrari car until the Friday practice of the next race. It’s a challenge and it’ll be tough to get used to the new car but if any driver in the world right now is up to the task, it is Schumacher.

The Ferrari car this year has been flat out average so don’t be expecting Schumacher to win (unless it rains and then we could have all kinds of great drama with the Regenmeister doing what he does better than anyone and driving in the wet) but be sure that Schumacher will get as much out of an average car as anyone can, he done that a number of times during his career and can certainly still do it again, even at 40-years of age. There is no pressure in the sense that any hopes of winning the title are over and with the car not being that good Schumacher can just go out and drive for fun and when he does that he can put on a great show, but then the pressure will always be there when the name Michael Schumacher gets behind the wheel of any car … people expect him to produce and a lot of people will tune in to see it happen.

Indeed, expect to see the viewing figures for the next Grand Prix in Valencia for the European Grand Prix on 23 August, go through the roof. F1 has always been popular but like with the Tour de France and the return of Lance Armstrong this year, people thrive on seeing the greats, even if they are supposedly past their best. The Massa incident aside, that fact that Schumacher was the man who replaced him must have the F1 powers jumping for joy … Nobody else would create such media attention and the usual media circus in the pit-lane at Grand Prix’s will go into overdrive in a few weeks. With BMW-Sauber announcing they are pulling out of F1 at the end of the season this is just the positive news that the ‘F1 is going to survive’ camp needed. Schumacher, the biggest brand name the sport has maybe ever had, is back at the most crucial time. In fact, the news of BMW pulling out has been completely over-shadowed now.

So I’m counting down the days to the European Grand Prix. I would have watched it anyway but this one I will be sure to catch the Friday practice as well as the qualifying and the race and I will be focused on what Schumacher is doing and certainly covering it on here.

Read more about: Felippe Massa, Ferrari, Michael Schumacher | ALL SUBJECTS |

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