The motorsports legend🧜 finally ended his incredib🌠le career after the 2021 season, but his decision to quit came months earlier and coincided with other huge news.

Rossi explains how he came to the difficult dec𒉰ision to st𝓰op.

“In the last few years when I was struggling mo൲re, I also talk🥃ed about it with Carlo, my trainer,” he said on Gianluca Gazzoli’s podcast.

“We said: ‘You have to race until you really can’t takeꦗ anymore, so you don’t have regrets afterwards’.

“There were a lot of riders who quit too💃 soon💟. 

“But they couldn’t 🌃stay away. They came back and messed things🌄 up.”

Rossi raced on for 12 years after the last of his seven MotoGP championships.

He was 42 when the time finally came to retire.

“I decided to stop after Assen,” he said.

“I wanted to race again but I said to myself: ‘Let’s see if I am competitive because I can’t come her൩e to finish 12th’.

“Assen was an important race𒀰 because it is one ofꦇ my favourite tracks.

“It is one of th🥀e tracks where I’ve won 10 times, so it has always been a bit of my home.”

But something else wa🌠s happening in Rossi’🙈s life simultaneously.

“Before leaving, I went to ꧟lunch with Francesca. She said: ‘I don’t like coffee anymore, str🌌ange because I’ve always liked coffee, maybe I’ll do a test in the next few days’.

“I told her ‘fine’ and left for Assen. While I was there, I did𝔉n’t think about her test.

“In the race I had a bad s🐓tart, crashed, I was fighting with Enea Bastianini, I wrecked the bike.

“When you are in the gꩵra♍vel you say: ‘If I need a sign to stop, it is this!’

“Imagine my state of minܫ꧅d because it means giving up a life that you had for 25 years.”

Rossi returned to Ita🦩ly knowing that his career was coming to an end, but he hadn’t told anybody yet.

Bigger news was still to come.

“When I 🌠ꦡarrived I told Francesca to come out for dinner but she said ‘no, you come here’.

“I had the impression that she wa🍰nted to tell me something.

“It happened all together - I found o💞ut I was becoming a father on the day that I decide𒆙d to stop racing.”

Rossi ܫand Francesca had their baby daughter in March 2022, by which time the MotoGP icon had retired.