He could be infuriating. I had numerous run-ins with Michael, most famously at
Spa in 1998 after we collided on a wet track and he stormed over to the McLaren
garage and accused me of trying to kill him. I asked him later, in
exasperation, whether he had ever been wrong about anything at any point in
his life. “Not that I can remember,” he replied. To me that summed him up.
He had complete and utter self-belief. It was what made him a champion.
And what a champion: 91 grand prix victories and seven drivers’ world titles.
I can say now, and again it is with the benefit of hindsight, that I was
never on his level. You cannot admit that, even to yourself, during your
career because you need to have self-belief but I have no trouble admitting
it now.
Michael was the reference point for me. I can see that now. If I beat him to a
win or a podium, I knew I had done a very good job. He gave my career
credibility.
As I said, we did not always see eye to eye but there were two sides to
Michael.
He was a ruthless competitor but at the same time he was a family man;
generous, kind. If you were part of his trusted circle then he was loyal. If
you were not, he could cut you off completely.
I never knew exactly which camp I belonged to but our shared relationship with Mercedes-Benz
meant that we were thrown together regularly.
I can vividly recall being invited to Michael’s private parties after the
German Grand Prix and staying up smoking cigars with him, late at night
after a few drinks, talking about just how lucky we were to be doing what we
loved.
There was always that underlying respect. When Michael retired at the end of
2006 he approached me and suggested we swap helmets. It had never even
occurred to me to ask him. Why would he have wanted my helmet? But he knew
that I collected them and I was honoured that he offered me his. It remains
one of my prized possessions and I know he keeps mine at his home in
Switzerland.
I think Michael might have got more credit before now had he not burnt his
bridges so completely with the British media, to whom he was completely
closed, at least during his first career. I think Sebastian
Vettel may have learnt from that experience.
In any case, Michael’s comeback with Mercedes showed he had a more human side.
And in a funny way, it cemented his legacy rather than harmed it.
Watching him struggle to match Sebastian and Lewis
Hamilton and Fernando Alonso, not always through fault of his own,
proved that time waits for no man. It was too easy during his first career
to assume that he simply swept all before him.
Those struggles with Mercedes gave us, certainly me, a new-found appreciation
for the unbelievable levels of consistency he achieved in his first career.
This skiing crash has connected Michael to the rest of us on a human level
once and for all. Here is a father, like any other, his wife and children at
his bedside praying for him to pull through. It is something to which we can
all relate.
The awful thing is that so often it takes something like this before we say
what we truly feel about someone.
I hope that in this instance, with Michael having received such swift medical
attention, and given the fact that he continues to receive the very best
treatment possible, he is going to emerge victorious once again. And when he
does he is going to realise in what esteem he is held.