According to motorsport-total.com, there is set to be announcment in regards to Sebastian Vettel and a potential role within Formula One at the Japanese Grand Prix.
The respected German website added that Vettel said he was “a little nervous” about it after talking about it during his time at the Nurburgring over the weekend where he drove his old RB7 car. Vettel will be attendance at Suzuka next weekend.
Photo credit: Red Bull Content Pool
The four-time World Champion stated at the Goodwood Festival of Speed back in July that he had some interesting ideas in regards to the future, including a potential interest in working with F1. He had a meeting with Stefano Domenicali in Monaco earlier this year.
On the driving side of things, however, a comeback cannot be completely ruled out either.
At 36, Vettel still has time to return to the sport should he want it. With Lewis Hamilton (38) and Fernando Alonso (42) still proving their champion class this year, the German will surely get offers if he’s interested in a comeback.
Fernando Alonso, Kimi Räikkönen, Niki Lauda, Alain Prost and Michael Schumacher are five big names who have done it previously.
When Martin Brundle bluntly said ‘you will comeback’ after mentioning other World Champions who have returned, Vettel couldn’t deny it.
“I can’t say no, because that you don’t know.
“I think it’s something that if you asked all of [the drivers who left but ultimately returned] probably some of them would have said: ‘No’ [to a return], some of them I don’t know, but in the end all of them came back, so I can’t exclude it.
“It probably will depend much on when, and obviously it’s not endless, because [at] 36 [I am] not like: Yeah in 10 years’ time, maybe I think about it. Then time has passed.”
Nonetheless, Vettel is happy away from racing and a return is nothing something he’s actively thinking about at the moment.
“It will depend on the challenge, whatever, but it’s not in my head right now.
“I’m enjoying the sort of outlook of the challenge of what to do next. It will be the way I see it, the biggest challenge for any racing driver and the biggest challenge for any sportsman, or sportswoman: What do you do after [retirement]?
“There’s a lot of life left and life can be great even though you’re not racing on the absolute limit in the fastest car in the world, but you can still do lots of great things that give you great pleasure.”
Vettel says he has been keeping race fit as well, but he has absolutely no interest in returning as a substitute for a one-off appearance in case of an injury for another driver.
“[I will return] because I want to, not because if somebody falls out I’m going to [substitute], not because of that.
“But my neck is not up to speed, it can’t be, but everything else [physically] is pretty, pretty good, I would say.”
