Sebastian
Vettel

Sebastian Vettel was born on 3 July 1987 in Heppenheim, Germany. He began kart racing at the age of eight and joined the Red Bull Junior Team in 1998. In 2004 he won the Formula BMW ADAC championship, taking 18 victories from 20 races, and in 2006 he finished runner-up in the Formula 3 Euro Series. From 2006 he worked as a test driver for BMW Sauber.

He made his Formula One debut at the 2007 United States Grand Prix, standing in for Robert Kubica, and finished eighth, which made him the youngest points scorer up to that time. From the Hungarian Grand Prix onwards he raced for Toro Rosso, replacing Scott Speed. In 2008 he took pole position and then won the rain-affected Italian Grand Prix. Aged 21 years and 74 days, he was the youngest Grand Prix winner to that point, and it remained Toro Rosso's only victory.

He moved to Red Bull in 2009 and finished the season as runner-up to Jenson Button. His win in China, along with his pole position there, was the first for the team. Between 2010 and 2013 he won four consecutive world championships. He secured the first of them in the Abu Dhabi finale and, at 23, became the youngest world champion in history. In 2011 he won eleven races, and in 2013 he took the last nine races of the season in a row, 13 wins in all. In 2014 he was winless, finished fifth and left for Ferrari.

At Ferrari he took three wins and third place in the championship in 2015, then fourth in 2016 without a win. In 2017 and 2018 he finished second in the standings behind Lewis Hamilton. He scored his 50th victory in Canada in 2018, and the last win of his career came in Singapore in 2019. His time with Ferrari ended after 2020. He drove for Aston Martin in 2021 and 2022, finishing second in Azerbaijan in 2021, the team's first podium and his last. He retired from Formula One at the end of 2022.

Over 299 starts he recorded 53 wins, 122 podiums and 57 pole positions. At the Race of Champions he won the individual title in 2015, and from 2007 to 2012 he won the Nations' Cup six times for Germany alongside Michael Schumacher.

Source: Wikipedia, “Sebastian Vettel”. Text licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.