Martin Brundle shares what Nico Rosberg did on Formula 1 grid that no driver has done since

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Nico Rosberg abruptly retired from Formula 1 at the end of the 2016 season. He’d just beaten Mercedes teammate Lewis Hamilton to the title by five points, but chose not to defend his crown.

He became just the fifth driver to voluntarily leave F1 after winning the championship, and the first since Alain Prost in 1994. Nigel Mansell, Jackie Stewart and Mike Hawthorn also feature on that list.

Rosberg made his F1 debut with Williams in 2006 after winning the GP2 series. He spent his first four seasons at Grove before joining Mercedes in 2010 to partner the returning Michael Schumacher.

He got the better of seven-time world champion Schumacher across their three-year partnership, winning his first Grand Prix in China in 2012. The following year, Hamilton arrived from McLaren.

They had been close friends, but from the start of 2014, when Mercedes became F1’s dominant team, their relationship deteriorated. Hamilton won the title at the double-points finale in Abu Dhabi that year and did so with multiple races to spare in 2015.

However, the German found another level in 2016 to edge a dramatic battle. Hamilton and Rosberg collided twice over the course of the campaign.

Nico Rosberg is the only driver to thank Martin Brundle for praise in his punditry

After retiring to spend time with his family, Rosberg has remained active in F1 through the media. He attends select races during the year, sometimes working with Sky Sports F1’s Martin Brundle.

Speaking on the recent Sky F1 podcast, Brundle revealed that Rosberg is the only driver to ever thank him for kind words in his punditry duties. He did so on the grid before a race in Malaysia.

Brundle, who’s worked in television since the 1990s, is now one of the best-known figures in the F1 paddock. He’s inevitably angered plenty of drivers with his comments down the years.

He said: “Nobody ever comes to you and says ‘thank you very much for what you said about us the other week’. I did have it once actually – it was Nico Rosberg.

“He came up to me in Malaysia – it was about a million years ago – and said ‘I’d like to thank you for what you said about me last weekend’. I said ‘I really appreciate that, because you’re the first driver who’s ever said anything to me like that – and by the way the last.”

Why Lewis Hamilton isn’t as ‘mature’ as former Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg

On talent alone, Rosberg didn’t seem to be a match for Hamilton. Before 2016, he realised he’d have to devote himself entirely to F1 if he was to stand a chance.

Fortune was on his side. Hamilton was demoted to the back of the grid with technical issues in China, couldn’t take part in Q3 in Russia and, most notably, suffered an engine failure while leading the Malaysian GP.

But Rosberg also scored key victories over his teammate in Azerbaijan, Italy, Singapore and Japan. He understood the importance of capitalising when Hamilton wasn’t at his best.

One former Mercedes engineer noticed a key difference between the two drivers. Rosberg was ‘more mature’ than Hamilton when it came to using data, a key part of success in modern F1.