Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Airlines go in the long run at the competition to reason. For the passenger the competition is good, because each competitor tries to undercut the other one.
Business is much less transparent than a win in a Grand Prix; in a race you drive over the finishing line first and you have won. In business it is different.
I employ 20 people in Vienna. The other 130 coworkers are pilots and flight companions. The Overhead is limited with me. Reduces naturally the costs of my fliers.
When things change a lot, some guys handle the change better than others, but that doesn't mean the guys that take longer to get the hang of things are suddenly slow drivers!
The guest gets at least as much service with us as with some established airline, if not even more. And at by far a favourable price. Thus the passengers remain gladly with us.
People always think that the worst time of my life must have been after the German Grand Prix crash in 1976, which put me in a coma and left me with severe burns. But it wasn't.
In Germany air became generally accepted Berlin in this area. It operated with 45 airplanes within the Low Cost range from Germany, and is one the most successful carriers in Europe.
There are some good traditions in our culture, one of which is that men dance with women. Soon we will reach the stage where we will all have to publicly apologise for being heterosexual.
When, after the accident, I came out into the world and people looked at me, they were shocked. It upset me. I thought they were impolite not to hide their negative emotions about my look.
In racing, you want to win - there are no rules, and you can do whatever you want. Flying a plane is the opposite: you respect rules and fly to the rules. You can't possibly compare the two.
Taking your first title is much more complicated and more difficult; it takes years of work - from go-kart to Formula One. The second comes more easily, because you've already got the experience.
People say that F1 is blessed with the 'best drivers in the world,' but I want to witness the 'total best drivers in the world,' and this means taking away the elements that make their job easier.
I always knew about the risks I was taking. Every year, someone you knew was killed racing. You had to ask yourself, do you enjoy driving these cars so much that you're prepared to take that risk?
When I was in motor racing, I had taken the decision to risk my life. But when you run an airline, and more than 200 people want to go from A to B - and they don't arrive - that's a different responsibility.
Sebastian [ Vettel] can also learn to be more laid-back. It's never too late to learn. He's got some way to go. He's young and will turn out well. I'm not worried about that. He'll raise the bar ever higher.
I fought my grandfather like you wouldn't believe. I went my own way and decided to become a racing driver. I don't think I would ever have fought as hard as I did if my grandfather had been a reasonable person.
You have a brake in your brain that stops you doing stupid things. The older you are, the earlier that brake comes on. When you're 20 you stop at nothing; when you're older you're cleverer than when you're 20, so your brain brake operates more often!
Millions around the world see Formula One as the pinnacle of motorsport, and I firmly believe that we should do whatever it takes to keep this accolade. Traction control, automatic gear changes, and launch control isn't my definition of the 'pinnacle of motorsport.'
One of the things that gave me most pleasure was a letter sent to me by Sebastian Vettel, written in his own hand, full of beautiful words and kindness. I wasn't expecting this; usually, drivers don't do this: they drive, and that's it. But he is a beautiful person.
I don't want to sound like a retrospective person stuck in the past, but the fact remains that, in my day, everything was in the hands of the driver - the gear changes, the delicate art of clutch control during race starts, managing engine revs during gear changes - everything.
It was the same with Schumacher: the need for the adrenaline rush, to push himself to the limit was always there. So without a Formula One car to race with he went on to do motorcycle racing and other stupid things, and obviously that wasn't enough to keep him happy, so he had a problem to sort out and returning to racing was his answer to the problem.
If you are for a long time at the top you've basically achieved everything you wanted to. Then the ball's breaking stuff starts to be too much: it's not what you do in the car, it's what you do outside the car - the press conferences, the interviews, the sponsorship commitments, the marketing appearances - that sadly go up to a level that the whole package, including the risks you take, the workload you do to get the car to work and for you to be quick in the races, it becomes too much.
I was not interested at all in Formula One when I left; I was very busy with my airline. But slowly I started missing the adrenaline rush and the driving of such fantastic cars at the limit. In reality this urge never disappears when you're a top driver, because I think we're a different breed of people, we need to take chances, we need to push ourselves to the limit all the time, that sort of thing. It stays with you, although you can kill it by losing motivation or other things in your life, but it never leaves you forever.