Following on from last week’s article about Red Bull’s much loved racer Mark Webber, we focus this time upon his incredible team mate Sebastian Vettel, the current F1 champion and no one is betting against him doing it again in 2012!
Sebastian Vettel
Nationality: Germany
Disciplines: Formula 1
The records keep tumbling for defending two-time Formula One world champion Sebastian Vettel. Red Bull Racing’s German F1 star became the youngest ever double world champion when he finished third in the Japanese Grand Prix in October 2011.
Vettel joined an elite list of drivers to have won back-to-back titles, which includes Fernando Alonso, Michael Schumacher, Ayrton Senna, Alain Prost, Jack Brabham, Juan Manuel Fangio and Alberto Ascari.
Seb has been setting Formula One records since his first weekend in the paddock. When he left the garage at Istanbul Park in practice for the 2006 Turkish Grand Prix he became the youngest man to take part in a grand prix weekend.
Less than six seconds later he became the youngest man to be fined by the FIA during a grand prix. Speeding in the pitlane was the offence and he was fined $3,500, “which is a lot of money when you haven’t got any, so that hurt!” Five years on and he’s still setting records, many of them still for being the ‘youngest whatever’, but increasingly for being simply the best.
In 2011 he had a fabulous car, the experience and confidence of being world champion, and a team-mate who’s struggled with the new Pirelli tyres. Seb has taken full advantage: here are some of the records he set during 2011.
– Youngest ever double World Champion: 24 years, 98 days.
– Most laps led in a season.
– Most championship points earned in a season.
– Most starts from the front row.
Heppenheim-born Seb began his racing career as a youngster in karts back in 1995, winning many titles before upgrading to open-wheel categories in 2003.
In 2004 Seb won the German Formula BMW Championship before moving on to the Formula Three Euroseries winning the top rookie honours that year.
Seb finished runner-up to Paul Di Resta in the 2006 F3 Euroseries, which led to F1 tests for Williams and BMW Sauber.
On August 27, 2006 Seb became the third driver for BMW Sauber, leading to his F1 debut in Turkey where he picked up the speeding fine. He was the youngest driver to participate in a Formula One Grand Prix race at the age of 19 years and 53 days.
On June 10, 2007, Vettel had his first opportunity in Formula One in the US Grand Prix, where he finished eighth and became the youngest driver ever to score a point in F1, at the age of 19 years and 349 days.
From that day on, the records have continued to fall to Vettel, who at the time of writing has 21 GP wins, 36 podium finishes, 30 pole positions, nine fastest laps and is ready to defend his World Drivers’ Championship title in 2012.
Red Bull Racing: http://www.redbullracing.com
