Internet Desk: Nico Rosberg has announced his retirement from Formula one on Friday, just after five days of securing his first ever Formula One title. He said, by winning the title he has “climbed my mountain” and is going out at the peak.
Rosberg won his maiden Formula One championship at the season-ending race at Abu Dhabi last Sunday, where he beat his team mate and three time champion Lewis Hamilton. Hamilton made the shock announcement at the press meet in Vienna, saying that winning the title was always his dream and after having achieved his goal, he don’t want to continue anymore.
He also wrote on Facebook: “Since 25 years in racing, it has been my dream, my ‘one thing’ to become Formula One World Champion. Through the hard work, the pain, the sacrifices, this has been my target. And now I’ve made it. I have climbed my mountain, I am on the peak, so this feels right. My strongest emotion right now is deep gratitude to everybody who supported me to make that dream happen.”
His rivalry with his Mercedes team-mate Lewis Hamilton was one of the best battle the season, after he had lost the 2014 and 2015 world title to his fellow team-mate. Hamilton overcame engine troubles to give a fight to Rosberg till the last race but could not overtake the German, who admitted he found the fight quite difficult.
“This season, I tell you, it was so damn tough,” wrote Rosberg. “I pushed like crazy in every area after the disappointments of the last two years; they fuelled my motivation to levels I had never experienced before. And of course that had an impact on the ones I love, too – it was a whole family effort of sacrifice, putting everything behind our target.”
The German champion said he started thinking about retiring after winning the race at Suzuka in early October and realised a world title was within his range. “From the moment when the destiny of the title was in my own hands, the big pressure started and I began to think about ending my racing career if I became world champion,” he wrote.
He said that he had almost made the decision by the morning of the season-ending Abu Dhabi race and that the process had cleared his head. He made a final call the day after winning the title. “It was a process on Monday,” Rosberg added. “I didn’t know if I had the balls, and I took a bit of time.”
The first people he told were his wife and manager, and then the team, via the team’s head, Toto Wolff. “Toto understood. He knew straight away that I was completely convinced and that reassured me. My proudest achievement in racing will always be to have won the world championship with this incredible team of people.”
I have a message for you: https://t.co/XtL5AWuY4n pic.twitter.com/LGK4Xnihoq
— Nico Rosberg (@nico_rosberg) December 2, 2016