Lewis Hamilton believes that Formula 1 likely hasn't seen the last of Sebastian Vettel, the Briton predicting that his former arch-rival will return to the grid at some point in the future.
On Sunday in Abu Dhabi, Vettel will close the curtain on his 15-year run among motorsport's elite, undertaking at Yas Marina with Aston Martin his 299th race start in Formula 1.
Vettel has said that he thought long and hard about retiring from the sport before announcing his decision last summer. And so far, the 35-year-old four-time world champion hasn't expressed any regrets about bringing his F1 career to an end.
On the contrary, Vettel has repeatedly said that he is looking forward to taking it one day at a time in the future and spending time with his family.
"I was just sitting here thinking most drivers are coming back, like he's coming back," Hamilton said in Thursday's media conference, sitting next to Vettel.
"You're probably going to come back," added the Mercedes driver, turning to his former adversary.
"We're seeing other drivers coming back. So, I'm sitting here kind of accepting... yes, it's your last race but you'll be back.
"Formula 1 has a way of sucking you back in, we've noticed that from so many other drivers."
Although he'll be sailing into the sunset come Sunday evening, Vettel hasn't said that he will be hanging up his helmet for good.
At some point next year, he'll likely have a look around and see what event or category of racing eventually catches his attention.
"I think you naturally do look at other stuff, I don't know yet is the answer," he said.
"I quite look forward to the idea of nothing at first and then see what it does to me. There's lots of other things in my head as well, other interests and ideas outside racing.
"But yeah, obviously I've done this for so long and it's been central to my life. So, it will be difficult to say that I'm not going to miss it, but how much and whether then I start to look at something else, we'll see how it goes.
"For some reason, I like rallying, but I can see it's a major challenge, because it's so different to what we do in let's say classic circuit racing."
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