13-time F1 race winner held talks with Ferrari over being Michael Schumacher’s teammate

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Formula 1 legend David Coulthard has admitted that he once held talks with Ferrari about becoming Michael Schumacher’s teammate.

Coulthard was speaking on the Formula For Success Podcast alongside former team owner Eddie Jordan.

Racing in Formula 1 is an incredible privilege and one that once drivers get a taste of, they don’t tend to want to let go of.

Just look at the likes of Fernando Alonso still racing into his 40s or Daniel Ricciardo happily taking a step down to AlphaTauri this year just to get back onto the grid and keep his ultimate F1 dream alive.

However, for those at the top of the sport, the aim is always to be in the fastest car.

During the early 2000s, there was only a handful of teams competing for the six points-paying positions at the time.

Ferrari, McLaren and Williams dominated the sport, but one man in particular led the way.

Before the Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen eras, Michael Schumacher was the man to beat.

His points tally and number of race wins will be further eclipsed in the future due to the restructuring of how points are paid out each race and the expansion of the F1 calendar.

However, David Coulthard has now shared that he once held talks about becoming the German’s teammate at Ferrari.

He instead ended up pioneering the Red Bull team during its infancy in F1 when his time at McLaren came to an end in 2004.

Things could have been very different had Ferrari not insisted on one clause in the Scot’s contract during those negotiations.

Coulthard held talks about joining Ferrari

Asked by Eddie Jordan if there were any teams he held talks with while he was at McLaren or before he joined Red Bull, Coulthard said: “Well, I did.

“I met with Jean Todt in Paris in his apartment to talk about the potential to drive for Ferrari.

“My recollection of the contract offered was basically a number two contract which despite what anyone can now conclude about my career, at that time I still felt that I wasn’t going to sign anything other than equal opportunity.

“And so if I was running fourth and Michael [Schumacher] was fifth then I had to move over and all the way right up if I was leading. And I just couldn’t agree to signing to that.

“All credit to Ron [Dennis] and McLaren, the contract they offered me was always equal opportunity and although there was a clause that said you had to accept the instructions of the team principal in whatever circumstance it might be, largely speaking, I was given a fair and equal opportunity to crack on and see how good I could develop my skills.”

It would have been fascinating to see Coulthard alongside Schumacher at Ferrari had those talks ended more positively.

Instead, the 13-time race winner continued to challenge for titles with McLaren Mercedes, finishing in the top three in the standings on five different occasions.

Schumacher was instead paired with Rubens Barrichello for much of that spell and the Brazilian was the perfect number two driver.

He was fast enough to support Schumacher in almost every race while never challenging for world titles.

It helped Schumacher win seven Drivers’ Championships, a feat only matched by Lewis Hamilton.