Backgammon, life away from F1, winning with Ferrari and... Canadian moose!
Tuesday 11 December 2018 11:32, UK
Sebastian Vettel has opened up on his passion for F1 and the importance of becoming world champion with Ferrari.
In a relaxed but revealing interview conducted while playing Vettel's favourite board game, backgammon, for Sky Sports F1's exclusively live coverage of Sunday's Canadian GP, the four-time world champion talks to Ted Kravitz about his life on and away from the race track, plus what his future beyond F1 could eventually hold.
Vettel is in his 12th season of F1 and long established as one of the sport's most successful drivers thanks to four world titles in a row between 2010 and 2013 plus 49 race wins, two of which have come this season.
But what exactly continues to drive him on?
"I'm enjoying it and I'm having fun," says Vettel. "This generation of cars are a lot of fun to drive; they have a lot of downforce. The only downside is that they're a bit heavy, so they're not as agile in low-speed to throw from one corner to another, but overall they are the fastest we've ever had and that's great and that's mainly what I enjoy, and working with the team.
"Obviously the dream is to win the big thing with Ferrari, which we haven't done yet."
In his fourth season at Ferrari, Vettel's ultimately distant second-place finish to Lewis Hamilton last year represents the closest he has come to delivering the Drivers' Championship back to Maranello for the first time since 2007.
Kimi Raikkonen's success that year represents the only title a Ferrari driver has won since Michael Schumacher, Vettel's childhood hero, left the team in 2006 to bring the curtain down on an era of record-breaking dominance.
It is Vettel's desire to bring similar success back to F1's most famous team, in addition to the pure joy of driving, which continues to motivate the 30-year-old, whose Ferrari contract runs to 2020.
"The fascination for the cars," he said, when asked why he continues in F1 despite all his prior success. "Unfortunately, we are doing something that is very difficult to share [with people]. The best answer would be to share the feeling inside the car, because people would be surprised. Everybody knows how it feels to drive a car or be driven in a car - but we are doing something else.
"I love racing. Trying to put the car on the limit. Racing against the best in the world.
"And then there's that big thing that needs to be stuffed, winning with Ferrari. It's a dream of mine and seeing how passionate people are inside this team, and being one of them, makes me proud.
"I still have something to do here. That's why I'm still here."
