Mick Schumacher ’not on radar’ - Marko

Dr Helmut Marko says he is not currently interested in signing up Mick Schumacher to Red Bull’s famous driver development programme.

At the same age of 17, Red Bull fast-tracked the meteoric F1 career of Max Verstappen.

But when asked about Schumacher, the young Formula 4-racing son of F1 legend Michael Schumacher, Marko said: "Mick Schumacher is not on our radar.

"There is nothing more to say," the Austrian, who is the architect of the Red Bull driver programme, added.

For his part, Mick seems comfortable about racing the road to F1 in meticulous style, having already decided to spend a second year in F4 rather than leap into F3 in 2016.

"For the moment, my goal is to become a good and complete race driver," said the German.

"Because of this, it’s important to me to have a solid base and to become confident in all areas racing will be confronting me with," Schumacher added.