Nigel Roebuck: Fifth Column

Last saturday's traditional Stars & Cars - the end-of-season celebration hosted by Mercedes-Benz - was never likely to include Fernando Alonso, and the matter was put beyond doubt the day before, when McLaren and the former world champion confirmed their parting of the ways. In Stuttgart Lewis Hamilton, ever the diplomat, said he wished Fernando 'all the best'.

While Alonso contemplates his future, so McLaren must give thought to his replacement for 2008. At the weekend, Hamilton spoke of the possibilities, eccentrically including his good friend Adrian Sutil, along with Nico Rosberg and Heikki Kovalainen, but my understanding is that Messrs Dennis and Whitmarsh are in no great hurry to make a decision. Williams have made it clear they would not welcome an approach for Rosberg's services (no surprise there), while Kovalainen will come into the picture only if Alonso decides on a return to Renault.

Some, meantime, quietly suggest that, for the '08 season, McLaren might ultimately opt to run test driver Pedro de la Rosa, prior - perhaps - to landing Rosberg for '09, when his Williams contract (although not option) will have ended.

Such a thing would not be without precedent. By the end of 1986, McLaren's intention was that Ayrton Senna would join the team for '88, but Keke Rosberg's retirement meant that a stop-gap team-mate for Alain Prost had to be found for '87. Thus, Stefan Johansson, newly replaced by Gerhard Berger at Ferrari, was offered a one-year contract, which he was pleased to accept.

In point of fact, for McLaren to run de la Rosa next year makes sense in a number of ways. He is very highly regarded by the team, perhaps not a top-drawer Formula 1 driver, but he is a pretty good one, and absolutely not a political animal, which, after the events of this season, would be welcome indeed.

At a time when the team must - by its own standards - inevitably be a little strapped for cash, Pedro will not be expensive. Last, his presence in the team could have a soothing effect on Santander, which cannot, let's face it, be too thrilled at how things turned out with the last Spaniard at McLaren.

All this is for the future, however, and for me the most significant aspect of Stars & Cars was Mika Hakkinen's announcement that, as of now, he is a retired racing driver.

For most of us, of course, Hakkinen 'retired' at the end of 2001, when he announced a sabbatical from F1, from which we assumed he would not return: his protege, Kimi Raikkonen, was replacing him at McLaren, after all, and Mika was more synonymous with the team even than Senna and Prost had been.

Like Rosberg, his former manager, Hakkinen suffered from withdrawal symptoms after a while. For a couple of years he had abandoned the monastic training regime demanded by F1, drunk a little vodka and smoked a cigarette or two, but in the Monaco paddock in 2004 he looked notably fit, and later there came the announcement that, for '05, he would be making a comeback, still a Mercedes man, now in the DTM.

In the case of Keke, it was a couple of years in the Peugeot sportscar team, and he was still ferociously quick, but in the very specialised DTM, Mika, like Jean Alesi before him, was not the force he had been in F1. His talent was still in clear evidence - a win in the rain at Spa in his first season left no doubt of that - but he never became a consistent frontrunner, and that must have been frustrating for a man who had twice won the world championship, a great driver.

And be in no doubt that's what Hakkinen was. It's an oddity of this sport what when we consider the great drivers of post-war racing history, we tend somehow always to come up with - and omit - the same names. In the relatively recent past, for example, most would think of Senna without a blink, but many would need to be prompted to mention Prost in the same breath.

This struck me recently when I was reading Jackie Stewart's comments about the pair of them in his new book, Winning Is Not Enough. "Ayrton," he wrote, "was undoubtedly the fastest of his generation, but, while many devoted Senna fans will disagree, Alain was a more complete racing driver. The Professor, as he was known, was able to analyse precisely what he needed to do to get the car set up in such a way that it never seemed necessary for him to extend either it or himself beyond the limit. In contrast, Ayrton always stretched the elastic as far as it would go."

In many ways, I thought of Hakkinen as Schumacher's Prost. As with Ayrton and Alain, Michael and Mika both had extraordinary natural ability, but the one was perceived to be the special force, the absolute best of his time, while the other - quieter - fellow perhaps never quite received his due.

I think in part that Senna and Schumacher were both mythologised because they, more evidently than their contemporaries, were prepared to take it 'to the edge' - literally to do anything to win, and in the case of both this led on occasion to some highly unsavoury tactics on the race track.

When, at Estoril in 1988, Senna edged the overtaking Prost towards the pit wall at 190mph, we had never - at that time - seen anything like it, and afterwards Alain was moved to say, "If we'd touched at that speed, it would have been like a plane crash. I knew Ayrton wanted the world championship, but it wasn't until today that I realised he was prepared to die for it. If he wants it that badly, he can have it..."

Similarly, when Schumacher did the same to Hakkinen, at the approach to Spa's Les Combes in 2000, Mika was not impressed. Only too aware of the lethal potential of a feud, he put Michael straight - in private - immediately after the race, and that was the smart thing to do because it involved no loss of face, and hence no public animosity.

Schumacher surely listened, though: he never changed his ways, but he didn't try them on Hakkinen again. Indeed, since his retirement, a year ago, Michael has confirmed what we had already assumed: of all the drivers against whom he competed in his 15 years of F1, Mika was the one he most admired, and - in terms of ability - feared.

Martin Brundle was the team-mate of both men (Schumacher at Benetton in 1992, Hakkinen at McLaren in '94), and I once asked him which of the two had made a greater impression on him. "In a race, I suppose you'd have to give it to Michael, because he never backed off - he was relentless like that. But in terms of pure speed... well, that's a bit different. In terms of looking at a team- mate's lap time, and thinking, 'Where the hell did that come from?', I never came across anyone like Mika..."

Towards the end of his F1 career, Hakkinen went off the boil a little. At the end of 1995 he had nearly died in a huge accident (caused by a puncture) in qualifying at Adelaide, and in 2001 he had another big shunt, in Melbourne, following front suspension failure. Although he was unhurt, by now he was married, with a son.

It wasn't a great surprise when the 'sabbatical' was announced, and there was genuine delight when, two races from the end of his F1 career, he scored a last win, at Indianapolis - beating Schumacher in a straight fight.

Unobtrusive in the paddock, perhaps, but stunning in a grand prix car. Mika, our thanks to you.