Many people would be happy to retire after winning just one Formula One title, but Sebastian Vettel admits he would be "quite sad" if he finishes his career with two Championships.
Vettel won 11 races this year and claimed 15 pole positions to secure his second World title this year and become the sport's youngest back-to-back Champion.
The German, though, hopes that the best is still to come in his F1 career.
"Being 24, it would be sad if you said, 'That is it. That has been the highlight of my life. From now on it's only getting worse.' I think that would be quite sad," he is quoted as saying by The Associated Press.
"I hope if even if I one day retire from Formula One that I do wake up in the morning and my best days are still to come. Otherwise I think it will be quite sad if there is nothing to look forward to in a professional life, but also in your personal life."
Vettel wrapped up the Championship in Japan and finished 122 points ahead of his closest rival - Jenson Button - in the Drivers' standings.
"It has been much closer than maybe the scoreboard indicated this season," he said.
"If you look at the gaps after qualifying or the race... in Japan we had the first four cars in five (seconds). If you look 10 years back it was probably a gap of 40 seconds between first and second.
"It is much more competitive and the gaps in qualifying have sometimes been big, but most of the time have been very small."
Despite Red Bull's success this year, Vettel knows they can't afford to take their foot off the accelerator if they want to stay ahead in 2012.
"We need to push, we can't lean back and think we have a good base and think we will be fine next year," he said.
"The guys are searching and trying to find something new and find the edge like we did last year, otherwise I think with the speed of development today in Formula One, very quickly you would start to go backwards."
