Mika Häkkinen ends his career

qballirl

Was looking at the DTM site after reading another article on these boards and taught this might interest some of you.

Two-time Formula 1 World Champion Mika Häkkinen retires from motor racing for good. On Saturday afternoon, in Stuttgart, the 39-year old Finn announced his retirement from DTM. Following his announcement made on the Mercedes fan day ‘Stars and Cars’, the ‘Flying Finn’ completed two laps at the wheel of his 1998 Formula 1 World Championship winner to then retire from motor racing for the second time - six years after having ended his career as Formula 1 driver, back in 2001.

”It’s over for me, now,” said Häkkinen, the idol of the public. “Bad news for my supporters but certainly good news for my rivals.” Following his first retirement, the Finn had enjoyed his private life for three years before catching the motor-racing fever again and making his comeback in DTM. There, he contested a total of 31 races and celebrated three race wins, the first as early as in his only third appearance on the DTM grid - on 15th May, 2005, at Spa-Francorchamps. And this year, he prevailed at the EuroSpeedway Lausitz and Mugello. As long-time member of the Mercedes family, he will keep on abiding by the group, in another role.

Ghost Train

Great F1 driver, those few seasons when he was racing against ferrari were some of my favourite races... jordan were doing well, irvine winning races, good times

Black Ball

My favourite because of his exhilarating interviews great entertainment.

also loved Alesi.

projectmayhem

"real men don't cry"

i'll never forget that german gp

Ghost Train

projectmayhem wrote:

i'll never forget that german gp

i think it was monza, italian gp

projectmayhem

eolhc wrote: »

i think it was monza, italian gp

was it? all i have is the chicane with bushes beside it in my mind, so i was thinking it was the old hokenheim...

anyway google says it was monza. either way... he cried

Kintarō Hattori

projectmayhem wrote: »

was it? all i have is the chicane with bushes beside it in my mind, so i was thinking it was the old hokenheim...

anyway google says it was monza. either way... he cried

And fair play to him for wearing his heart on his sleeve. It made him all the more human.

pburns

His results in the DTM don't do justice to his abilities - he was a GREAT F1 driver.

I remember when I first started watching F1 about '94/'95. Even though he was in an uncompetive car and not even a race-winner at that point there'd be a little tingle of excitement watching his qualy laps. He was sooooo quick over one lap!

After his accident he changed, seemed to become more measured, more the all-rounder. I always admired the way he came back from such huge injuries to win 2xWDC.

stever

I thought he was gone for good when he left formula one after the accident in 2000. That accident was almost identical to the one in adelaide in 95 , He left F1 at a good time with hindsight just before ferarri's domination...

SouperComputer

quick driver, funny guy and one of my favs until he had a crack at the championship. Don't remember what year it was, but I remember him throwing in the towel a few times at some races when things looked bad. I think he won the championship that year.

Anyway, my point is that the greats NEVER give up. Senna, Mansell, and even Schumacher in fairness. I witnessed Haakinen give up on a number of occasions, which really disaponited me, I lost a lot of respect for him.

I remember Portugal 93 though! Great peformance by him, out qualified Senna and then got a little to far into the dirty air in the race.

Big

fair play to you for posting this thread as it is a sad day to see such a talented driver hang up his helmet after such a chequered career.

the amazing thing is - when you think of it - how many F1, Indycar drivers have ever really made the switch successfully from single seaters to saloons: very few that I can think of. As a previous competitor in tin tops, the driving style in saloons is completely different to that of single seater racing, coupled to the fact saloon car racing is like stock cars -be prepared to get rammed, nudged, and deliberately taken out !! something that cannot be achieved on the same scale in single seaters !!

I always recall a quote I read somewhere of Motor Racing:

" Motorsport is Life: Whatever comes before or after is just waiting,,, "

with fond memories,

Big