Categories: Look backRace and classic pictures

Hakkinen's final Formula One roll-out

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It was on October 14, 2001 that Mika Hakkinen lined up on the grid for the last time in a Formula One car. Hakkinen had decided to take a year off from the sport, and mid-way through the following year he made it official that he wasn't coming back.

His final race - the 2001 Japanese Grand Prix - saw Hakkinen finish in fourth place, having opted to let his McLaren team mate David Coulthard go past him in the closing laps to claim third place while Hakkinen himself was content to bow out with fourth.

"I'm happy that David finished on the podium," Hakkinen said after the race. "I must admit that by letting him past I wanted to give him something back for the occasions in the past when he has helped me.

"I want to thank everybody who I have worked with for the past nine years for all the effort they put into making my career so successful.

"It will take some time to understand my new life and establish whether I enjoy it or not. Right now I'm looking forward to my sabbatical but I'm sure I will also miss Formula One."

Since making his Formula One début at the 1991 United States Grand Prix with Lotus, the Finn had gone on to record 161 Grand Prix race starts with 20 wins among a total of 51 podium places. He had started from pole position 26 times and recorded the fastest lap of the race on 25 occasions.

And of course he was a two-time world champion, having pipped Michael Schumacher to the crown in 1998 and then similarly outrun Schumacher's Ferrari team mate Eddie Irvine in 1999 when Schumacher himself missed half the season after breaking his leg in an accident at Silverstone.

Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.