Ecclestone regrets Schumacher’s return

After three years of retirement, the most successful driver in F1 history had decided to return to competition with the Mercedes team, which had dominated the championship the previous year under the name Brawn GP. At the end of the venture, it must be noted that the sporting record is not the most dazzling. For his part, Bernie Ecclestone believes that Michael Schumacher made a mistake by coming out of retirement in 2010.

« He shouldn’t have come back, » reports Mister E to ESPN while acknowledging that this failure is probably not entirely attributable to him: « What would he have done if he had a Red Bull or a Ferrari? I suppose when he arrived at Mercedes, he expected the team to be better than it was. »

It is true that the record of the German brand after three seasons is not the most impressive. In 2012, it certainly secured its first victory as a full-fledged team since its return, at the Chinese Grand Prix, but it has continued to fall back in the hierarchy throughout the Grand Prix races, to the point of no longer being able to regularly score points.

Next year, Mercedes will open a new chapter in its history with the arrival of Lewis Hamilton, who is embarking on a new challenge after spending six seasons at McLaren. While many observers believe that Michael Schumacher could have stayed on the grid in 2013 if he hadn’t delayed his decision for so long, Ecclestone thinks that Hamilton’s arrival didn’t hasten the German’s choice: “I think Schumacher would have left anyway. Hamilton had many options: leaving McLaren, going to a team even less competitive than Mercedes, or going to Mercedes,” concluded the F1’s financial chief.