In just a few short hours Michael Schumacher will start (and hopefully complete) his last race as a Formula 1 driver in Brazil, the last F1 race of the season. Schumacher holds many F1 records. Most notably, he holds 7 F1 titles.

Schumacher has also had the opportunity to take his 69th and final career pole, but due to an engine blowout, his hopes were dashed at the start of his final qualifying round.

Interestingly, Schumacher’s teammate at Ferrari, Felipe Massa took the pole despite also having problems. Massa’s problem required the changing of the gearbox, a process that took a mere minutes. In Formula 1 though, exchanging an engine, despite all of the money spent on R&D and technicians/engineers, still takes a long time. Moreover, an engine change means that Schumacher would drop from his previously guaranteed 5th row start to a more harrowing, and difficult 10th row start.

Meanwhile for Schumacher to win the title, he would have to have a flawless race AND Fernando Alonso would have to drop out. With those odds, Ferrari will have to settle for second place in both the individual and constructor’s championships.

Stay tuned for more analysis on the Brazil Grand Prix to follow after the race Sunday.

Update: Schumacher’s Ferrari suffered a fuel pump failure rather than an all out engine failure. This means that he will start 10th as he was unable to make a final round qualifying run.

This entry was posted on Saturday, October 21st, 2006 at 8:13 pm and is filed under Ferrari, Formula 1. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. This post was read by 288 people until now. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.