"It's difficult to put a feeling to it before you've even won it," Verstappen added. "I never really thought about it too much, how it would be or how I would feel.

"But of course it was a very long and intense season so once everything was done and the championship was decided, it was a bit of a relief because I was like 'finally I can rest a

bit and have a bit of time off'. "Of course at the time I was also like, 'okay, I've achieved my life goal in racing'. That was also a really nice feeling."