Sebastian Vettel has winning habit that began with Bernd Rosemeyer

18 October 2009, 02:05:35 | Richard Williams

The German is the Formula One world title outsider but few doubt his championship credentials

By the side of the A5 autobahn from Frankfurt to Darmstadt stands a grey stone stele, about 6ft high, bearing the name of one of Sebastian Vettel's most illustrious predecessors. On Wednesday, as Vettel was arriving in Brazil to pursue his outside chance of depriving Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello of the 2009 world championship, a small group of enthusiasts gathered to place a bouquet commemorating the 100th anniversary of the birth of Bernd Rosemeyer, who died on that spot in January 1938 in the course of a speed-record attempt.

Like Vettel, Rosemeyer was a natural. In 1935, aged 25, he graduated from motorcycle racing straight into the Auto Union team. The following year, thanks to three grands prix victories at the wheel of the company's tricky mid-engined car, he was crowned European champion, the pre-war equivalent of today's world title.

In those days German drivers were as dominant as German cars, and today it seems one of grand prix racing's most puzzling anomalies is that although Vettel is the 44th German driver to take part in formula one since 1950, only one of his predecessors – Michael Schumacher, of course – managed to capture the world title. Even though he failed to make it through the near-lottery of yesterday's rain-drenched first qualifying session, no sensible judge would bet against Vettel becoming the second.

With four wins to his credit, three of them in his second full season in the top flight, Vettel is making the same sort of impact as Schumacher, Ayrton Senna and Lewis Hamilton. These were drivers who did not need to serve an apprenticeship in grand prix racing. They were blindingly fast from the start, and their speed, matched by their early results, conferred an authority that outweighed their inexperience.

No eyebrows are raised when Vettel's Red Bull-Renault starts a race from pole position. It seems an utterly normal occurrence, a tribute to the symbiosis between a talented young driver and the fine car created by Adrian Newey, the team's chief technical officer. And the sight of Vettel on the top step of the victory podium is starting to become almost as unexceptional.

To snatch this year's title from his two rivals he needs to win at Interlagos today and in Abu Dhabi in a fortnight's time, while hoping that misfortune strikes the Brawn drivers.

"The pressure is on the people in front of me," he said here on Thursday, during a press conference shared with Button and Barrichello. "For me it is pretty straightforward. You don't have to be a genius to work out that from now on we simply have to win the two races and hope that these two mess it up."

Born in 1987 in Heppenheim, a small town overlooked by a medieval castle among the Odenwald mountains in south-west Germany, Vettel came from a modest background – his father runs his own small roofing company – and started racing karts before his eighth birthday. After winning Germany's Formula BMW series in 2004, he spent two years in the European Formula Three series before becoming the BMW-Sauber team's reserve driver in 2006.

When Robert Kubica missed a race after a spectacular accident in Canada the following year, Vettel took his chance. Eighth place in the United States grand prix made him the youngest driver to score a world championship point and earnt him a mid-season transfer to the Toro Rosso team. A year later a commanding performance from pole position on a wet weekend at Monza gave the team its first victory and made him, at 21 years and 74 days, the youngest winner in grand prix history.

Suddenly even Lewis Hamilton, on his way to becoming world champion at 23, did not look quite so young any more. Vettel was also winning friends through his seemingly open and uncomplicated nature, his mischievous sense of humour and – it has to be admitted – his excellent command of idiomatic English, although there was a sign of a more volatile side to his temperament when he hurled his steering wheel away and marched straight through the garage after yesterday's reverse.

This season his errors in Australia, Monaco and Singapore have been balanced by commanding wins at Shanghai, Silverstone and Suzuka, but the mistakes and a series of Renault engine failures have probably cost him the chance of becoming the youngest champion of all – or, some would say, merely deferred the opportunity until next year.

"Looking back, I had five races where I didn't finish, so of course that didn't help," he said. "But we cannot change it now, so nothing to regret. I still think it's a good season for us, the best one we have ever had, so it's very positive and we can still do it." While yesterday's misfortune turned such an outcome from improbable to near-impossible it did nothing to damage his prospects in the longer term.