Nikita Mazepin felt the single season he spent in Formula 1, in which he scored zero points, made him the perfect person to send some "words of wisdom" to four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel upon his retirement.
The German raced in F1 for the final time in Sunday's Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. As he clambered out of his Aston Martin for the final time, he brought the curtain down on a career which yielded 53 race wins and score more than 3,000 points in total.
And Vettel is not the only driver to drop off the grid after this season. Daniel Ricciardo, Mick Schumacher and Nicholas Latifi are all without a race seat for 2023 after being let go by their respective teams.
Mazepin knows how it feels to be axed, having been let go by Haas in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine earlier this year. He had been in F1 for just one season prior to that, during which he failed to score a single point and gained a reputation for spinning his Haas on a regular basis.
With that in mind, many F1 fans were surprised to see him take the rather bold step of sending some public advice to far more experienced racers than him on social media. He was in attendance in Abu Dhabi at the weekend, and posted a photo of himself trackside alongside his self-described "wisdom".
"At this weekend’s F1 race in Abu Dhabi," he wrote to begin a lengthy Instagram post. "Nice to be here as a guest and see old friends. Got me thinking about some words of wisdom I can share with Seb, Daniel, Nicky and Mick as they get ready to move on. So, here's what awaits you in the five stages of departing the stable."
He went on to name those five stages, describing in length his "denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance" before adding a personal message for each of Vettel, Ricciardo, Latifi and Schumacher to round off his post.
Reacting to his post, fans couldn't resist poking fun at the Russian. "Yeah, I'm sure you got words of wisdom for Seb," wrote one sarcastically. Another expressed the belief that the post amounted to "the F1 driver with the worst F1 career giving advice".
One fan said Mazepin appeared to have "lost his head" while several referred to him as "MazeGOAT" in a tongue-in-cheek manner. There were some, though, who felt it was a nice message, including one who wrote: "As a person you are a true champion." Several others said they were impressed with how the 23-year-old has "matured".
