Felipe Massa has said that he had no negotiations with Formula 1 teams prior to announcing his decision to retire at Monza.
The Brazilian said that he wanted to let the news slip at Monza, where exactly a decade ago Michael Schumacher announced his own retirement news.
"Michael saved my career in 2006 and I'll never forget it," Blick quotes Massa as saying. Indeed, Ferrari had already signed Kimi Raikkonen for 2007 and were weighing up whether to keep Schumacher or Massa for the other seat.
Fast forward 10 years to 2016, and 35-year-old Massa said that he already knew he would be calling it a day "a few months ago".
"I didn't talk with any other teams, even Williams, about 2017," he is quoted as saying by Brazil's UOL.
Watching Massa's announcement from the background on Thursday was his current teammate Valtteri Bottas, who is tipped to stay with the Grove team for 2017.
"Felipe is a really nice teammate and maybe slightly undervalued as a driver," the Finn told MTV.
"The recent races have been a bit difficult for him, but he'll come back again. There is nothing bad to say about him at all."
Massa's F1 career began with Sauber in 2002.
