GROSSETO, Italy, 10 December 2003 — Seemingly unbeatable in Formula One, six-time World Champion Michael Schumacher will tomorrow test his speeding skills against a supersonic jet fighter at an Italian military airbase.
Schumacher, at the wheel of his Ferrari F2003-GA, will take on the brand new Eurofighter Typhoon hunter-bomber in two straight-line speed contests down the runway of the Grosseto base, in central Italy.
In theory, there should be no contest. The F2003-GA can reach a maximum speed of up to 400 kilometers per hour while the Eurofighter can speed at almost 2,450 kmh, aviation officials say. But the duel has been designed to provide maximum equilibrium between the two contestants, meaning the outcome of the contest will be hard to call.
The first race, which will take place over a 500-meter course, is likely to favor Ferrari’s superior acceleration. The second, over a 1,500-meter track, should provide an advantage to the Eurofighter.
“We have organized things so that the race may be as balanced as possible, with one race that should, in theory, favor the aircraft and the other favoring the Ferrari,” said Italian Air Force General Sandro Ferracuti.
“In any case, both machines tend to enhance the individual skills of their pilots,” Ferracuti said.
Italian astronaut and test pilot Maurizio Cheli will pilot the Eurofighter, which was born out of a collaboration between Italy, Germany, Britain and Spain.
A similar contest took place in 1981, when Canada’s Gilles Villeneuve and his Ferrari 126 CK turbo beat a F-104 jet fighter over a one-kilometer race at Istrana airport, in northern Italy. Fifty years earlier, in 1931, however, Italian motor racing legend Tazio Nuvolari and his Alfa Romeo 2300 had to concede defeat against a biplane.
That same duel will be replicated tomorrow. But this time, it will be Schumacher at the wheel.
