For a long time it was uncertain whether Alfa Romeo would also be fighting for points in Formula 1 with Valtteri Bottas and Guanyu Zhou in the 2023 season. Now the team has created clarity. This is not good news for Mick Schumacher. The 23-year-old now has only two options.
While Mick Schumacher continues to fight for his future, the free cockpits in Formula 1 are becoming fewer and fewer. Alfa Romeo confirmed 23-year-old Chinese Zhou Guanyu as driver for the coming season alongside Valtteri Bottas (Finland) this morning. This means that there are only three places left in the premier class for the coming season. For Schumacher, however, only an extension at Haas or a change to Williams seem to be realistic options.
“I want to achieve more in this sport and with the team, and the hard work we’ve put in since the beginning of the year is just the first step towards where we want to be next season,” Zhou said : “I look forward to the next chapter in our history together.” The 23-year-old has scored six points so far in 2022, his colleague Bottas, who joined the team from Mercedes at the start of the season, has 46 points. There have been repeated reports recently that Alfa Romeo is planning to get its young driver Theo Pourchaire into Formula 1 as early as 2023.
Haas team boss Günther Steiner continues to play for time when deciding on Schumacher. Whether the son of record world champion Michael Schumacher is allowed to stay with the US racing team depends on the Italian’s “gut feeling”, as he said on RTL: The probability is “Fifty-Fifty”. Williams recently announced the separation of Nicholas Latifi from Canada at the end of the season.
Most recently, Formula 1 sports director Ross Brawn had campaigned for Schumacher. He sees the personnel as groundbreaking for the future of the racing series in Germany. It is “extremely important that Mick Schumacher continues his career in Formula 1. As fascinating and important as the technology in Formula 1 is: the kids hang posters of the heroes behind the wheel in their room,” says the former Micks engineer Father Michael Schumacher at Sport1.
