Mick Schumacher has defended his steadier climb up the motorsport ladder as he works to become a "perfect driver".

In recent years the likes of Max Verstappen, Charles Leclerc, George Russell and Lando Norris have flown through the junior categories into Formula 1, some even skipping championships in the process.

By contrast, Schumacher has spent two years at each level, but in the case of F3 and, potentially, F2, has gone on to become champion at the second attempt.

Some have suggested this slightly longer timeframe means the 21-year-old doesn't have the talent of those who made the journey to F1 more quickly.

But Schumacher is confident his approach will reap rewards later.

“Everything is a learning curve,” he told Formula1.com. “If you take the time to go into detail, if you take the time to learn things right, in the long term it will work out better than if you try to rush things.

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“In the long term, what I want to do is to create the perfect racing driver and become the complete racing driver. That’s why last year was so important, trying to understand every single bit of detail before thinking of the results.

“I don’t want to talk about luck but in some ways, last year was a very unlucky season – we had a few reliability issues and some contact, which was unfortunate, but I think we always showed good pace, which is what mattered to us.

“Ultimately, I want to go to F1 being as best prepared as I can be and to do so, I have to also go through tough times because during those, you learn the most.”

Now his patience is set to be rewarded with a seat at Haas for 2021, with confirmation expected later this month.

And asked if was ready for that challenge, the son of seven-time F1 champion Michael Schumacher was clear.

“In recent years I have always pursued the goal of developing myself as a driver and I am very satisfied with my development,” he told Germany's t-online.de.

“That’s why I definitely feel ready for Formula 1. I’m also very pleased that the results are correct and that my team and I have consistently achieved good results.

“It is important to keep all my concentration on the current season and to win the championship title.”

Schumacher was set to make his first F1 practice appearance in Germany last month before fog led to the session being cancelled.

“Of course, I would have preferred if I could have driven, but overall it was a very positive weekend for me because working with the team, the meetings and the discussions with the engineers enabled me to take a lot with me and now I can better assess how a Formula 1 weekend actually works,” he added.

“My main focus was on physical fitness. Of course, this is a topic that is very present all year round anyway, because Formula 2 is also very physically demanding, but in Formula 1 the requirements are a little different.

“For example, there is no power steering in Formula 2, so it is very important to have trained arm muscles there. In Formula 1, the g-forces are much higher, so the neck is more stressed there.”