Former Force India team principal Colin Kolles believes that Mick Schumacher will be starting to feel the pressure from Kevin Magnussen after the Dane’s excellent start to the season.
Magnussen returned to F1 after a year away racing in IMSA following the sacking of Nikita Mazepin amid Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine, and he has out-qualified Schumacher in each of the first two races of the season, putting 12 points on the board in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.
The German suffered a huge shunt during qualifying for the race in Jeddah, and this came as a result of him having to push that bit harder due to the substantially higher benchmark Magnussen has set compared to his predecessor, according to the former Minardi, Force India and HRT boss.
“He has to work very hard to get to the level of Kevin Magnussen,” Kolles told Sport1.
“He came back in without testing and after a year without driving in Formula 1 and was immediately better.”
He warned the 23-year-old that Magnussen, who raced with Haas for four years between 2017 and 2020, will only improve from here.
“Magnussen won’t get worse either, but rather better,” he affirmed.
Former F1 driver Christian Danner was sat next to Kolles as a pundit, and he agrees that Schumacher is endeavouring to aspire to greater heights now that he has an onerous target to live up to.
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“[The crash] was really a shocking moment [and was] a result of the pressure his new team-mate is putting on him. The bar is much higher there,” added the former Arrows and Rial driver.
“The great thing is he accepts the challenge.”
Schumacher’s car was unable to contest the race on Sunday after sustaining too much damage.
Team principal Guenther Steiner revealed that the circa $1 million worth of damage included everything but the engine and the survival cell.