MONTE CARLO: Former world champion Michael Schumacher dismissed a media inquisition into his controversial Monaco Grand Prix history as ‘boring’ on Thursday.
On a day when Fernando Alonso topped the time charts in practice in his Ferrari for Sunday’s race, Schumacher, who won here for the Italian giants in 2001, was reminded of his last participation here in 2006 when he ‘parked’ controversially at the Rascasse hairpin and allegedly spoiled Alonso’s lap.
They were title rivals at the time, Schumacher for Ferrari and Alonso for Renault, and, predictably, both preferred to forget the incident rather than recall it.
In the resulting exchanges, a disappointed Schumacher, now driving for Mercedes, said the line of questioning from some reporters was "boring".
On the track, the German wound up just outside a top four made up of Alonso, who was one-tenth of a second ahead of Nico Rosberg, in the leading Mercedes, Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull and Felipe Massa in the second Ferrari.
Schumacher was fifth, but after a scruffy session that included almost colliding with defending champion Jenson Button’s McLaren in the pit lane and a near-scrape of the barriers at Portier and then an excursion across the chicane at the exit of the tunnel.
He said: "That was a lot of fun. I got back into the rhythm of the track, especially on the long runs, and I think we can be quite confident as the car is definitely quite reasonable to handle.
"The other teams, who have a top-speed advantage on other tracks at the moment, do not have this advantage here — so the whole field comes a bit closer together, which will make it a very interesting qualifying."
