sport

Nico Rosberg

Nico Rosberg certainly has the pedigree to make it in Formula One but as another year passed without a grand prix victory doubts are being raised about whether he has the talent.

Nico, the son of 1982 World Champion Keke, began his motorsport career with the usual karting route, winning the Regional Côte d'Azur mini-kart Championship in 1996 before moving on to the French and North American Championships in 1997 and 1998.

The following year he entered the Junior European Karting Championship, finishing in fourth place.

Two more years of karting followed, where he took second place in the Formula A European Karting Championship and in 2001, the Super A World Karting Championship title.

A switch to single-seaters was next on the cards for Nico, who won the Formula BMW ADAC Championship in 2002 before moving on to the F3 Euro-series.

During his two-year stay in F3, he claimed four race wins.

In 2005, Nico landed his big break in F1 when BMW-Williams signed him as their second test driver.

The German, who was also competing in the GP2, tested regularly for the team and after easily winning the GP2 title was confirmed as Williams' second driver for the 2006 season.

However, his first season in Formula One was a difficult one for the young German, largely due to Williams' failures rather than his own.

Although Nico scored points in his very first grand prix and even finished the race with the fastest lap time, the rest of the season was a struggle. Only one other points-scoring finish followed as Williams-Cosworth battled with pace and reliability.

During the first half of 2007 season luck had not been with Rosberg, who had been forced to watch as his team-mate Wurz scored the greater amount of points, despite Rosberg's greater pace. Later on that season Rosberg eventually passed his team-mate in world championship points as he began to make a name for himself in F1.

The German netted a total of 20 points during his second season in F1, including a fourth placed finished at the season-ending Brazilian GP.

Coupled with his strong qualifying performances compared to Wurz's, Rosberg proved to be a sort after commodity when McLaren announced they'd sacked Fernando Alonso. Williams, however, were quick to confirm Rosberg for the 2008 Championship during which he partnered rookie driver Kazuki Nakajima.

Rosberg easily got the better of his team-mate, although once again it was not the best of seasons for the German. A podium finish at the very start in Australia and one in Singapore proved to be the highlights of an otherwise topsy-turvy season.

Rosberg eventually finished the season 13th in the Championship on 17 points and almost immediately warned Williams that if 2009 isn't any better he will consider looking elsewhere for a drive.

And that's exactly what he did. Another mediocre season without a podium finish saw Rosberg finish seventh in the Championship, however, it's not seventh he wants, it's a win.

As such the German opted to leave Williams in favour of a deal with Mercedes GP, the team that won the World titles as Brawn GP in 2009. The move appeared to be a great one for Rosberg right up until the time Mercedes announced they had also signed seven-time World Champion Michael Schumacher.

Schumi's return, rather than detract from Rosberg's own performances, allowed the younger German to focus on his own game while all the pressure was put on his team-mate's shoulders.

And

although there wasn't a race win for Rosberg in 2010 as Merc GP struggled with the balance and weight-distribution of their W01, there were three podium finishes, 142 points and the honour and prestige of soundly beating his team-mate by almost double the number of points.

The younger of the two team-mate's was not able to put in a repeat performance in 2011 as, for the second year running, Mercedes GP failed to get out of the starting blocks with pace.

In fact, one could argue that Rosberg's team - at least on paper - took a step backwards as they were not able to reach the podium at all. His best result was a P5 in China, one place short of Schumi's best, although overall he did net more points than the Champ, finishing the season seventh in the standings with 89 points.

During the season, Rosberg also committed his long-term future to Mercedes GP, adamant that this team can and will win grands prix and World titles in the future. Does the future start now?