Thursday March 9th, 2000

by Timothy Collings

Double world champion Michael Schumacher exuded optimism on Thursday that he can make a good start to the season in Sunday's season-opening Australian Grand Prix and win Ferrari's first drivers' title for 21 years.

The 1994 and 1995 champion, Schumacher has narrowly missed out on the title in the last few years. He said that has made him more determined, but has not added to the pressure he feels.

"I do feel very hungry because I missed out on a good opportunity last year," said the Ferrari driver at a news conference in Melbourne.

"I now feel that the opportunity is even greater because we seem to be much better prepared than ever. All this together makes me very optimistic, very hungry, very motivated.

"I'm very optimistic but at the time I'm careful to see what is going to be the end of the story.

"The target has been very clear for the last three years. It's no different and to me, there's no difference in pressure -- in particular to what happened last year."

Schumacher's optimism has been raised by the work done in creating and developing the new Ferrari car.

"You always have to find the balance between finishing the car as late as possible to have the latest developments on the car for the first race, and have optimum reliability," he said.

"What is important is to finish the first race, if possible in first place, and if you do this, you have done everything right. So far we feel that we've found the right timing.

"The car is much better prepared. We feel that we have made a significant step. The car is reliable, we have had good preparation and therefore we feel very confident.

"But we felt very confident last year, to some degree, and we were proven wrong. I hope this year won't be same."

Schumacher said McLaren will again be the main competitors, in spite of Ferrari's improvements.

"I certainly can confirm that we have developed a faster car, but I can share McLaren's doubts (about potential competitiveness) because we don't know where we will be in relation to them.

"I feel things will be close. I believe McLaren and Ferrari will battle for the championship. Obviously Mika has been faster than David has been so far. Who is the fastest we shall have to wait and see."

Schumacher said he is not worried by his age, 31, and the advancing years.

"I believe that I have quite a job to do right now which is to win the championship for Ferrari. This means that I don't have to worry about too many things in the future.

"I feel that I'm young enough to do this, for sure, until I'm 35 and we'll see what happens afterwards."