Interest in Formula 1 has gone through the roof across the world in recent years.
But the frenzy created by, among other things, Netflix's Drive to Survive programme and the blockbuster rivalry between Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen last year, seems to have passed Germany by. Interest in F1 from Dusseldorf to Berlin, Rostock to Munich has waned, in contrast with that general worldwide trend.
Former Mercedes motorsport vice-president Norbert Haug has summed up the situation and pointed to a lack of top drivers and no race in the country, among other things, as major issues that are affecting the popularity of the sport in the country.
"In Germany, Formula 1 has turned into a tragedy that every motorsport enthusiast can only be ashamed of," he told RND. "Between 1994 and 2016 there were German world champions like an assembly line: Seven titles from Michael Schumacher, four in a row from Sebastian Vettel and finally the last one to date from Nico Rosberg in 2016 in the Silver Arrow.
"In 2010 there were still seven German Formula 1 drivers in one season. Today Nico Hulkenberg is the only one, in what is at best a second-rate team and Mick Schumacher is a promising substitute driver – but at least in the right team [Mercedes].
"For a dozen years, in the late 1990s and 2000s, there were two Formula 1 races a year in Germany. On RTL, twelve million interested people watched instead of three million today. There hasn't been a German Grand Prix for a long time."
Haug went on to point out that, even though Mercedes is one of German's most famous international brands, its F1 team is UK-based. It also has two English racers in Hamilton and George Russell, while newly-signed reserve Schumacher is one of the only German drivers even close to F1 right now.
He added his opinion that Germany "could not have developed a less ambitious and less successful German Formula 1 strategy, which specifically excludes the Mercedes works team which – correctly – operates out of England and has two great English drivers".
Vettel once pointed out that there is a financial barrier which will be blocking many of his compatriots from pursuing a career in motorsport. "I think that to allow more children, boys and girls to start running, this sport should be much cheaper, because currently I think it's too expensive and unthinkable for most of them," said the four-time world champion.
