Schumacher and Haas team-mate Nikita Mazepin supported the timesheets two weeks ago during qualification for the season opener in Bahrain and finished in 19th and 20th place respectively.
Haas decided against a major development for the VF-21 car and treated 2021 as a transition year to focus on the new regulations of 2022.
Schumacher ended the second quarter in Bahrain eight tenths of a second behind and was almost four tenths of a second slower than 18th Sebastian Vettel.
However, the German driver felt that Haas’ qualifying performance was roughly what the team had expected on its first race weekend.
“We shouldn’t say that it was disappointing in any way,” said Schumacher when asked about the second quarter gap in qualifying in Bahrain.
“I think we did pretty well. We had a clean lap. We wanted that. We managed to get close to what we wanted in terms of pace.
“Obviously we had a small deficit. I’m 95% happy with my lap. Obviously there are still a lot of things I can improve and will definitely work on them for now.
“For me, it’s about gaining that experience and hopefully turning it into a consistent pattern of improvement from one session to the next.”
Mick Schumacher, Haas VF-21, George Russell, Williams FW43B
Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images
The nine other F1 teams managed to get at least one car through to Bahrain by the second quarter, seven of which also had a driver role in the third quarter.
Still, Schumacher hoped that Haas would be able to compete with other teams for berths in the second quarter throughout the season.
“I am positive in this sense, yes,” said Schumacher.
“We will work on ourselves. I will work a lot on myself. I see the motivation in the team and I see no reason why we shouldn’t be optimistic that during the entire season – hopefully at some point – we can even go into the second quarters. “
Schumacher’s optimism was borne out by Mazepin, who lamented a “very bad” qualifying round as he finished eight tenths of a second behind his teammate after turning 1 in the final moments of the first quarter.
“I think what he said was correct,” said Mazepin when asked if he would agree with Schumacher’s Q2 conviction.
“In terms of my lap out there, it was obviously very bad because I had this problem with the brakes and obviously only had one attempt on the lap itself, which is annoying.
“But then it’s very important to look at the bigger picture. We knew that first qualifying and this year would be quite difficult. “
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