Tuesday, November 30th, 2021
Because of Schumacher’s preferential treatment?
Mazepin got his new chassis from dad
Nikita Mazepin regularly looks old in the first season in Formula 1 in a direct duel with teammate Mick Schumacher. He feels disadvantaged. To change that, even father Dmitry Mazepin steps in during the course of the year – and buys his son a new chassis.
Even before the first start of the Formula 1 season in 2021, there was fear in the Mazepin camp that Nikita Mazepin would be disadvantaged compared to Mick Schumacher. The reason: While Schumacher was provided with the only new chassis, the Russian had to go into his debut season with a chassis from the previous year.
“Yes, it was really a problem,” said father Dmitry Mazepin in an interview with the Russian broadcaster Match TV. “It just happened that a chassis was destroyed in an accident at the end of the year and a new one was built. According to the regulations, it was possible to continue to use the old chassis and the team decided to give Mick Schumacher the new chassis and Nikita received it old.”
Only one car was used in the test drives in Bahrain, so both drivers there drove with the same chassis. In the race, however, Mazepin had to use the old chassis. “He immediately gave feedback that it was different from that [anderen] Chassis is different, “explained the father of the Formula 1 rookie.
Chassis “paid for with its own money”
Since his son saw no country in the duel against Schumacher in the following weeks and clearly had problems with the old chassis, the billionaire sat down with the team at the end of May to look for a solution. The first solution was a simple swap, which was also carried out at the Monaco Grand Prix. For the first time, the Russian was promptly faster than his German team-mate, who had a violent crash with the old chassis in the third free practice session.
In order to permanently solve the problem, Dmitry Mazepin then suggested that the team provide his son with a brand new chassis and pay out of pocket. “We made the decision to build a new chassis and I paid for it with my own money,” said the entrepreneur. He wanted to ensure that his son and Schumacher compete under the same conditions.
However, the new chassis didn’t really help Mazepin in the fight against Schumacher. Even with the new structure, the German was faster than his opponent in almost all training sessions, qualifying sessions and races.