Steward: Schumacher should have been disqualified

The retired F1 racer Warwick feels the seven-times world champion should have been shown a black flag for almost driving the Brazilian into the pit-lane wall.

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LONDON // Michael Schumacher would have been disqualified from Sunday's Hungarian Grand Prix if his risky move on Rubens Barrichello had been earlier in the race, steward Derek Warwick said yesterday. Warwick, a retired Formula One racer acting as the drivers' representative on the four-man stewards panel at the Hungaroring, told BBC radio that the seven-times world champion should have been shown a black flag for almost driving the Brazilian into the pit-lane wall.

Instead the former Ferrari ace was handed a 10-place penalty on the starting grid for the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa-Francorchamps this month. "Throwing a black flag would have shown a better example to our young drivers," said Warwick, who overlapped with Schumacher in F1 for one season in 1993 when the Briton drove for the Footwork team. "But by the time we got the video evidence we ran out of time and we had to do it retrospectively. We interviewed Rubens and Michael and it was kind of disappointing how Michael handled it, and we had no option but to give him a 10-place penalty. We felt a 10-place penalty is a big penalty to carry for Spa.

"It kind of puts him out of the race at Spa and hopefully he will learn from that and remember that the new stewards will not tolerate that driving." * Reuters