Schumacher confirms move up to F3 in 2017

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Mick Schumacher has confirmed he will move up to the European F3 championship in 2017, racing for Prema Powerteam.

The son of seven-time world champion Michael, Mick Schumacher drove for Prema in the Italian and German F4 championships last season, and finished runner-up in both title fights. His second year in single seaters included 10 wins, six pole positions and 22 podium finishes as the 17-year-old showed strong progress.

Prema has now announced Schumacher will remain with the team to step up to F3, with the German saying it is a natural progression for his career.

“F3 will be the ideal step for me to make, and I am totally fired up for the new year to start," Schumacher said. "I am also really happy about staying with Prema, because this is such a professional team and I will again be able to learn a lot.

"The next season will surely be challenging, but the tests we’ve been doing in the past weeks proved the F3 car is extremely fun to drive. I can’t wait for 2017 to begin!”

Team principal Angelo Rosin says Schumacher has already shown he is capable of reaching the top in his early years of racing.

“We are thrilled to continue working with Mick in 2017," Rosin said. "Not only he is a skilled driver, he is a great guy and already showed he has all what it takes to be a top all-round professional. Debuting in a challenging series like the FIA F3 European Championship is not going to be easy, but we will be 100 percent behind Mick to help him keep impressing as he did this year.”

2016 driver ratings: 12-1

2016 driver ratings: 24-13

2016 team-by-team review: Part two

2016 team-by-team review: Part one

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Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.