Schumacher optimistic

(27-Oct-98) - Michael Schumacher believes that he will beat Mika Hakkinen
at Sunday's Japanese Grand Prix and win the world championship.

"We've made encouraging progress," said Schumacher of the team's
exhaustive pre-race testing. "I'm happily surprised, astonished even,
by the improvements we've achieved in these tests and this makes me very
optimistic for success."

"I feel that something will happen which will make me win the title. I
have a feeling I'll be able to win the race and Eddie Irvine will come
second. I cannot explain why I have these feelings but I can assure you I
do."

"I didn't think we could improve the car so much in the gap between
the two races. It is better in every area," he added.

The team are expected to introduce a new engine for qualifying, believed to
be the first Formula 1 engine to produce more than 800bhp, and have been
working on suspension and aerodynamic tweaks, however, as Schumacher
revealed, most of the testing work has concentrated on tyres.

"Tyres will be the most important factor. I hope after all the
testing, I have chosen the right one. The rest will depend on the
definitive set-up of the car. I hope everything is prepared in the right
way."

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