Schumacher Born: F1's Most Dominant Champion Arrives

Michael Schumacher spent a decade making the rest of the Formula 1 grid look like they were racing a different sport. Seven world titles. 91 race wins, a record that stood for 16 years until Lewis Hamilton surpassed it. He drove with a precision that bordered on mechanical, studying telemetry data the way other drivers studied weather reports, obsessing over fractions of seconds that most people couldn't perceive. Born on January 3, 1969, in Hürth, West Germany, he started karting at age four in a kart his father built from a discarded lawnmower engine. He made his Formula 1 debut in 1991 at Spa-Francorchamps, qualifying seventh in a car he'd never driven on a track he'd never seen. Jordan hired him for one race. Benetton poached him the very next week. His first championship came in 1994, a season overshadowed by the death of Ayrton Senna at Imola. He won four consecutive titles with Ferrari from 2000 to 2004, turning a team that hadn't won a drivers' championship in 21 years into the most dominant force in the sport's history. He retired in 2006, came back with Mercedes in 2010, retired again in 2012. Then in December 2013, a skiing accident in the French Alps changed everything. He hit a rock at Méribel. The helmet cracked but likely saved his life. He was placed in a medically induced coma for six months. He has been out of public life ever since, cared for privately by his family at their home on Lake Geneva. The extent of his recovery remains unknown to the public. His son Mick raced in Formula 1 from 2021 to 2022.