After Schumacher and his team took out the Trophy class honours in their maiden tilt in the GT World Challenge Australia series in 2021, they began this year's campaign in ultra impressive fashion at Phillip Island.

Not only did Schumacher post class wins in the two races staged at the track behind the wheel of his Audi R8 LMS Ultra, but he placed sixth and fourth outright respectively.

In race two the cars he beat to the chequered flag included the Triple Eight Mercedes-AMG van Gisbergen shared with Jefri Ibrahim and the Porsche driven by Stephen and Brenton Grove.

Given Schumacher had one less set of tyres to use as well as a 40 kilogram ballast in the race given his Trophy class status, it made the effort even more impressive.

It had Schumacher leaping for joy on the podium.

"Here at Schumacher Motorsport, which just have a really good feeling going on at the moment," he enthused.

"We come to these race meetings as a small Bathurst team, all Bathurst guys, we work out of our Bathurst workshop and we're turning up and putting it to major race teams and drivers. They take a step back and look at us and say 'These guys honesty aren't a joke, they're putting together results'.

"That there is what makes us feel so happy at the end of a race meeting."

While those involved with the Schumacher Motorsport team left Phillip Island with smiles on their faces, on Saturday there was some frustration.

Schumacher was meant to start from fifth on the grid, but did not leave his garage in pit lane order. He was one of four drivers who copped a penalty.

"I still got out in the train of cars leaving pit lane, but they brought us out in pit lane order and because I didn't leave in my order, they penalised me with a pit lane start," he said.

However, Schumacher managed to overcome that setback and went on to claim the class win by some 53 seconds over Brett Hobson in his Nissan Nismo GT3.

"I got luck there was safety car and that gave me the opportunity to catch the field and once I was able to catch the field, I was able to start picking off cars which I obviously had more pace than," Schumacher explained.

"Hobson had an infringement in pit lane and had to serve a drive through penalty which worked to my advantage as well.

"So I took the class win which I was thrilled about and finished sixth overall, which was a pretty bloody good result against the names I am up against.

"I was pretty happy with that, but that wasn't the drive I was happiest about for the weekend, Sunday was the drive I was happiest with.

"I won the class again and was fourth outright. I beat Grove and Triple Eight, I passed them in the last three laps."

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While Schumacher had been the fifth fastest on track during qualifying for race one, the second qualifying session did not go as well.

Even with his driver coach Tim Slade offering assistance over the radio, it took Schumacher 13 laps to set a flyer. That was still impacted by traffic and a set of tyres that were not at their peak and he qualified 10th

"We didn't have a lot of luck in qualifying for race two, I kind of got stuck on a rough place on the circuit where I struck a bit of traffic which kept baulking us for lap time," he said.

"Sladey was on the cans for quali trying to talk me through getting a bit of space. For two laps I actually couldn't have driven any slower around Phillip island to give myself some room to the GT4 guys ahead of me, but even still on my flying lap I caught them around the back and that put my lap off."

When it came to the one-hour race things played out much better as Schumacher climbed six spots on the grid. The only entries to beat him where those who had Audi Sport factory ace Christopher Mies plus Supercars talents Chaz Mostert and David Reynolds as part of their line-up.

It was a drive that earned him praise from many in pit lane.

"I just had really, really good, consistent race pace, if you look at the lap times compared to the pros, it was right up there," he said.

"The car in the race was on rails, I couldn't have had a better car, I don't think I've had a better car ever to be honest and that's a big call. I really was just nice to drive.

"After Sunday's race I had quite a lot of people come up to me and say 'Great race'. Guys like David Reynolds, Michael Caurso, Luke Youlden - it makes me feel good."

Schumacher sits 17 points clear of Hobson in the Trophy standings after round one, but he has a bigger goal than making it back-to-back class championships.

"We're not looking to try and compare myself to our direct competition, which is Trophy class, we're looking to get an outright podium and that's what I'm working towards," he said.

"As an amateur who doesn't get in the seat all that often, I'm now starting to run consistent race-pace times that are up there with the Supercars drivers and pros. That makes me pretty proud."

Round two of the series will held at Mount Panorama in May as part of the Bathurst 12 Hour support program.

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