(Motorsport-Total.com) – Ex-Ferrari team boss Jean Todt has revealed in a recent interview how he convinced Michael Schumacher to switch to the Italian team before the 1996 Formula 1 season, namely by offering him a new challenge and at the same time laying the foundations for a stronger technical structure.
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“In 1995, we were still rebuilding the team, and we knew that 1996 would really be the year we wanted to seriously attack,” Todt recalls the Scuderia’s past in the High Performance Podcast.
“Among the engineers, the chassis people said: ‘We don’t have a good engine,’ the engine people said: ‘We don’t have a good chassis,’ and above all, they said: ‘We don’t have good drivers.’ So I said: ‘Alright, let’s make sure no one can say we lack the driver with Michael.'”
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“Since he was the best driver, we had to convince him,” recalls the then Ferrari team boss. “So we started talks at the beginning of 1995, and then our lawyer Henri Peter and I spent a day in Monte Carlo with Michael and Willi Weber – and after just one day, we signed the contract.”
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When asked how it was possible to get Schumacher to sign after just one day, Todt adds: “I think he thought it would be something special to drive for Ferrari. He liked challenges and was very curious, very professional.”
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But “he didn’t want to commit without certain guarantees,” the Frenchman continues. “That’s why I simultaneously contacted, without them knowing about each other, Ross Brawn to offer him the position of Technical Director, and Rory Byrne to propose the role of Chief Designer.”
“Both had already worked with Michael at Benetton. And Michael knew about it,” says Todt. The rest is history: Schumacher led the struggling Ferrari team, which at that time had not won a drivers’ title since 1979 and a constructors’ title since 1983, back to the top.
The German, together with the Scuderia, won five of his seven world championship titles and also helped the team to secure a total of six constructors’ titles. Schumacher remained loyal to Ferrari until his first retirement after the 2006 Formula 1 season.
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