It’s about more diversity: after Schumacher’s coming out, the big battle in Formula 1 is really starting
Ralf Schumacher’s move to make his homosexuality public is also a problem in the paddock in Hungary. The fight for more diversity only really begins at the Hungaroring.
Lewis Hamilton is still the only black driver, a woman in a regular cockpit, not even remotely. How diverse is it? formula 1 actually now? There are affirmations and efforts, initiatives and projects. “It’s one thing to say something is inclusive, but it’s another thing to create an environment where those affected feel free and comfortable,” says Lewis Hamilton.
Formula 1 is a space dominated by men. Still. “We can do 100 percent more,” the 39-year-old Briton insists.
Hamilton: “He clearly didn’t feel comfortable saying this in the past”
There are currently no female team bosses at the ten racing teams, but there are a few women in key positions, such as Red Bull’s strategist Hannah Schmitz. “It was difficult to be one of the first women in the command post,” the British woman once said.
Your compatriot Hamilton is something like that Michael Schumacher With seven titles, he is the record world champion in the highest motorsport class, but he is also a pioneer in the fight against racism and for equality and diversity.
Hamilton describes the fact that Michael’s brother Ralf Schumacher recently came out as homosexual as a “positive message”. In 2007, he also raced against the now 49-year-old. It was Hamilton’s first and Ralf Schumacher’s last season in the racing series, which for decades was exclusively characterized by its macho and masculine image. “He has clearly not felt comfortable saying this in the past,” Hamilton said.
That this is no longer the case is also an honor for him British and his former rival Sebastian Vettel“The change started here when I was on the grid with Seb and we were fighting against what the government was doing,” Hamilton recalled of the Hungarian Grand Prix three years ago.
Ralf Schumacher once criticized Hamilton for his protests
Just before the race, Vettel had worn a rainbow-coloured T-shirt with the inscription ‘Same Love’ during the Hungarian national anthem – and he was warned about it. The then race director had said that before the start, the drivers would be given the opportunity to show their support for the official Formula 1 campaign ‘We race as one’. The national anthem of the host country must be respected by the drivers wearing their racing suits.
But it is precisely the moment when cameras are on the drivers and so any statements have a great reach. At the end of 2022, the world association also added a new article to the International Sports Code that prohibits the display of political messages without prior permission. Protesting with the handbrake off, so to speak.
Vettel and Hamilton had taken a stand on a planned referendum against the rights of non-heterosexual people (LGBT) in Hungary. Vettel said it was a disgrace to the country. Hamilton in particular had previously used the global stage of Formula 1, which collects double-digit sums from organisers for a race, to make political statements.
Hamilton also denounced human rights abuses on the Formula 1 open stage, which seemed unthinkable for a long time and also earned him criticism from Ralf Schumacher. “His values are very important and he can express them Instagram and represented in the other social networks – the only question is why he always has to do it in a Mercedes suit and on the race tracks,” he said on Sport1 in November 2020. “Even though Ralf said it was not a good idea to do this kind of thing, he may have changed his mind today,” Hamilton said now in Budapest.
Ralf Schumacher has now paved the way for others by coming out, the Briton praised. But there is still a long way to go for Formula 1, which has also enshrined the obligation for more diversity and inclusion in its statutes and has dedicated a separate story on its homepage to the reactions to Ralf Schumacher’s move.
Stereotypes of a male domain, driven and controlled by testosterone, must be broken. Despite the F1 Academy’s own racing series since 2023 under the leadership of Susie Wolff, the prospects of a female driver on the starting grid of Formula 1, where the so-called grid girls have been abolished since 2018, are still slim. But there are also statistical reasons: there are simply far more boys than girls driving karts and, after all, there are only twenty cockpits in Formula 1.
lsc/dpa