Michael Schumacher: F1's Asphalt Soldier

He's washed-up, he's finished, and he must know it.

But there is no grace in Michael Schumacher's last battles, and no forgiveness for any who have failed to bow low enough to him in the past.

Anybody can make mistakes, even a great seven-time world champion. But Schumacher made two big mistakes; he decided to come back, and he came back with Mercedes GP.

By what epic feats of mismanagement Mercedes transformed the hugely successful championship-winning Brawn team into a joke, I just do not know. I might suspect that Norbert "who-ate-all-the-pies" Haug has the stain of failure on his porcine fingers, but cannot establish that to be the case.

The pairing of a driver whose glories are in the rear-view mirror with a struggling team was always going to be an embarassing proof of sports oldest truism: they never come back.

Having been outclassed by his (much) younger teammate Nico Rosberg throughout the season, Schumacher was not a hot pick to do well in the Hungarian grand prix.

Towards the end of the race he was pottering along in tenth place, positioned to pick up a single championship point, when Rubens Barichello closed to overtake.

Barichello and Schumacher have a history.

When the lachrymose Brazilian was Schumacher's teammate at Ferrari, he was required to play a strictly subordinate role, including letting the German pass him on the track.

Since then, Barichello has spoken resentfully of how he was treated, and that will have been noticed by Schumacher.

So the stage was set for confrontation, and the TV cameras followed the pair as they contested that last point-scoring place.

For several corners, Barichello tried to pass, but each time Schumacher closed the door on him; he did not win his championships by being easy to overtake.

And then, on the main straight, Barichello put his slightly faster car on the right-hand side, to complete an overtake going into the first corner.

Schumacher reacted by pulling across the track to force Barichello towards the concrete wall. It was heart-stoppingly dangerous, but at that moment I honestly believed he would have preferred that they both die than that Barichello should pass him. Happily, we were spared a catastrophic crash.

After the race Schumacher was asked about the incident by the media, and we saw that the icy arrogance at the core of his being has not been melted over time, will not be melted, cannot be melted. He blamed Barichello.

Like a defeated army that can turn suddenly and bite at its more powerful foes, Schumacher, with no hope of victories to come, is still dangerous in retreat.