Four-times world champion Sebastian Vettel to retire from F1 at end of season

The four-times Formula One world champion Sebastian Vettel has announced he is to retire at the end of this season. The 35-year-old German is currently driving for the Aston Martin team and made his F1 debut in 2007. He became the sport’s youngest world champion when he took his first title, at 23 years and 134 days old and amassed 53 wins so far in a glittering career.

“The decision to retire has been a difficult one for me to take, and I have spent a lot of time thinking about it,” he said in a statement.

Vettel made an impact from the off but success has largely eluded him for the second half of his time in F1. He won his four titles with Red Bull between 2010 and 2013 and joined Ferrari in 2015. He challenged for the championship twice with the Scuderia in 2017 and 2018 but was beaten both times by Lewis Hamilton.

He stayed with Ferrari until the end of 2020 and joined Aston Martin in 2021 but has not won a race since the Singapore Grand Prix in 2019. However, during his time with Red Bull and Ferrari he scored a huge number of victories and his 53, puts him behind only Hamilton on 103 and Michael Schumacher on 91.

In recent years Vettel has been increasingly outspoken on environmental and social issues. He strongly supported Hamilton’s calls to address racism and for diversity in the sport and has been forthright on the urgency of the climate emergency. He has of late expressed his ambivalence at competing in F1, a sport that has an enormous carbon footprint because of the amount of air travel involved. These are issues he is likely to continue to pursue but he did not reveal his plans for the future.

“At the end of the year I want to take some more time to reflect on what I will focus on next,” he said. “It is very