Michael Schumacher's family feud explained: All about the legend's nephew's public feud with his mother

Former seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher's brother, and former F1 driver, Ralf Schumacher has been involved in a public feud with his ex-wife Cora Brinkmann. The former German driver raced at the pinnacle of motorsport for 10 years for teams like Jordan and Williams F1 and won six times.

The 49-year-old married Brinkmann in 2001 with their son, David, born in October of the same year, and the family residing in their villa near Salzburg. However, Ralf Schumacher and his ex-wife decided to divorce in 2015 after an acrimonious separation involving a battle for child custody.

Michael Schumacher's brother came out as gay earlier in 2024 and decided to put up the villa near Salzburg on sale for around $8 million. As per Gazzetta, Brinkmann did not respond well to the news and said:

"I feel like I was used during the marriage, robbed of my best years. Was he honest with me? And, most importantly, did he love me? When he was racing, there were so many rumors in the paddock, but he always denied my questions".

"I learned directly from a real estate portal that our family home in Salzburg is being sold. My son David? No message, no address, no indication of where he is now. What kind of person does one have to be to do something like this to a mother?"

However, Michael Schumacher's nephew David Schumacher did not agree with his mother's comments and spoke out against her.

Michael Schumacher's nephew calls out her mother publicly

Michael Schumacher's nephew and Ralf's son David stated that his mother, Cora Brinkmann, threatened him during the separation period from the former Williams F1 driver.

As quoted by the aforementioned source, the 22-year-old said:

"I don't want to talk about family matters in public but unfortunately my mother seems to think otherwise, I just want to live my life in peace and achieve my goals."

"When my parents divorced in 2015, she threatened me that if I didn't stay with her, she would destroy my lifelong dream of becoming a racing driver, as her signature would be needed on some documents.Since she was suffering from mental problems and was not in the right frame of mind to take care of me, I no longer wanted to be around her," David said.

The former F3 driver recalled that his mother even got in a physical altercation with Ralf and they "had to call the police because she started beating him non-stop."

The young Schumacher concluded that Brinkmann's "accusations" against Ralf were "not even remotely true" and claimed that his mother's behavior was "shameful".