The Die Welt article, picked up by numerous German papers yesterday, said Ferrari chief technician Ross Brawn believed the cockpit could be revamped with heavy padding for Schumacher's leg if he returned early from his injuries.

Brawn also said the second consideration was the two-time world champion needed another way of applying gas besides his foot -- including the possibility he would operate a gas pedal with his hand.

``Technically that wouldn't be a problem,'' Brawn said.

Schumacher is expected to be out of racing for at least two months after a high-speed, head-on crash into a tyre wall in the July 11 British Grand Prix where he broke his right leg in two places. No one was available for comment at the Ferrari headquarters in Maranello, Italy.

Schumacher, recovering in a Swiss clinic, expressed scepticism atthe plans in yesterday's edition of the Berlin daily, B.Z.

His spokesman, Heiner Buchinger, said the German driver told him ``the centrifugal force would unleash hellish pain'' if he drove and that he was concentrating on getting healthy again.

At Britain's Northampton general hospital, surgeons inserted a 30-centimetre steel pin in the leg to help heal fractures in Schumacher's tibia and fibula.