Alex Zanardi

Alex Zanardi In 2007, as a WTCC driver Nationality Italian Born (1966-10-23) 23 October 1966 (age 46) Bologna Debut season 2005 World Touring Car Championship Teams BMW Team Italy-Spain Car no. 9 Starts 105 Wins 4 Poles 1 Fastest laps 4 Best finish 10th in 2005 Previous series 1992, 2005–06 2003–04 1996–98, 2001 1991–94, 99 1989 & 91 1988–90 Italian Superturismo ETCC CART FedEx Championship Series Formula One F3000 International Italian F3 Championship titles 2005 1997–98 1990 Italian Superturismo CART FedEx Championship Series European F3 Cup Formula One World Championship career Active years 1991–1994, 1999 Teams Jordan, Minardi, Lotus, Williams Races 44 (41 starts) Championships 0 Wins 0 Podiums 0 Career points 1 Pole positions 0 Fastest laps 0 First race 1991 Spanish Grand Prix Last race 1999 Japanese Grand Prix Medal record Men's road bicycle racing Paralympic Games Gold 2012 London Road time trial (T4) Gold 2012 London Road race (T4) Silver 2012 London Road team relay World Championships Silver 2011 Denmark Road time trial (T4)

Alessandro "Alex" Zanardi (Italian pronunciation: [ˈaleks dzaˈnardi]; born 23 October 1966) is an Italian racing driver and paracyclist.

He won two CART championship titles in North America during the late 1990s. He also had a less successful career as a Formula One driver. More recently, he has attracted widespread praise for his return to competition in the aftermath of a crash in 2001 that resulted in the amputation of his legs. He returned to racing less than two years after the accident, competing in the FIA World Touring Car Championship for BMW Team Italy-Spain between 2003 and 2009.

Switching sports, Zanardi took up competition in handbiking, a form of paralympic cycling, with the stated goal of representing Italy at the 2012 Summer Paralympics. In September 2011, Zanardi won his first senior international handbiking medal, the silver medal in the H4 (handbike) category time trial at the UCI World Road Para-Cycling Championships.^[1] In September 2012 he won gold medals at the London Paralympics in the individual H4 time trial and the individual H4 road race,^[2][3][4] followed by a silver medal in the mixed H1-4 team relay.

On 11 September 2012 he was included by International Paralympic Committee into the London 2012: Top 12 performances list.^[5]

Early years [edit]

Alex Zanardi was born in Bologna, Italy, as the son of Anna and Dino and moved with his family to the village of Castel Maggiore on the outskirts of the city when he was four.^[6] His sister Cristina was a promising swimmer until her death in an automobile collision in 1979.^[7]

Zanardi began racing karts at the age of 13. He built the kart from wheels used from a dustbin and pipes from his father's line of work. In 1988, he joined the Italian Formula 3 series with a fifth place as his highest finish. In 1989, Zanardi took two pole positions and three podiums despite suffering from his team switching to unleaded fuel which reduced the engine power in his car.^[7] In 1991, he moved up to the Formula 3000 series with the Il Barone Rampante team, who were themselves newcomers to the series. Winning on his F3000 debut, he went on to score two more wins that season, en route to second in the championship.

Formula One (1991–1994) [edit]

1991

Zanardi had his first taste of Formula One at a test session at Paul Ricard where he drove a Footwork. By the end of that year, he had commenced his career in Formula One. Three starts for Jordan were his reward for a strong F3000 campaign.^[7]

1992

For 1992 Zanardi had to be content with guest drives for Minardi, replacing the injured Christian Fittipaldi. In the off-season, he tested for Benetton, but contracted with Lotus for 1993.

1993

Zanardi compared reasonably to teammate Johnny Herbert and was important in fine-tuning the team's active suspension system, scoring his first ever F1 point at the Brazilian Grand Prix.

Zanardi suffered an injury when an elderly motorist collided with his bicycle knocking him off and ran over Zanardi's left foot leaving several bones broken. Despite this, Zanardi raced in Germany but spun out.^[7] However, his season ended prematurely after he suffered a terrible crash during practice for the Belgian Grand Prix where he suffered a concussion.

1994

Still injured, Zanardi missed the beginning of the 1994 season, but he returned in the Spanish Grand Prix, replacing Pedro Lamy, who had been hurt in a testing crash. However, that year's Lotus was highly unreliable, and Zanardi failed to score a single point or qualify higher than 13th.

Sports car racing [edit]

With Lotus Formula One having folded, Zanardi took time to race in Sports car racing. His first meeting was at a Porsche Supercup event at Imola. Zanardi later raced at a four hour event at Donington Park where he and Alex Portman retired with eight minutes remaining despite leading by over a lap. The pair managed to finish 4th at a wet weather race at Silverstone.^[7]

Champ Car [edit]

Zanardi racing in Vancouver

During 1995, Zanardi went to the United States for a drive in the Champ Car series. He felt that finding a race seat would be easy with Formula One experience but no teams took any interest. However, Reynard Commercial Director Rick Goyne managed to secure Zanardi a test drive at Homestead with Chip Ganassi Racing. Zanardi officially signed a contract on 23 October 1995. The team's race engineer Mo Nunn advised Chip against signing him, as he believed Italian drivers were too prone to mistakes.^[7]

He rapidly became one of the series' most popular drivers. He took the pole for his second race, although his first win didn't come until mid-season. In total he won three races in his rookie season and five pole positions,^[8] finishing in a tie for second in the championship points (officially scored third as Michael Andretti had won more races) behind team-mate Jimmy Vasser (who did not win after round 6 of the season) and being named Champ Racing Rookie of the Year. He would win the championship for Ganassi in both 1997 and 1998, bringing home twelve victories.

A win came at Laguna Seca for the final race of the 1996 season, where he conducted a highly risky overtaking move at the Corkscrew corner (known to many racing fans as "The Pass"; the maneuver was banned for future years), on race leader Bryan Herta, having fought his way through the field. After winning a race, Zanardi was fond of spinning his car around in tight circles, leaving circular donut-shaped patterns of tyre rubber on the track; this would eventually become a popular means of celebrating race wins all across America.

Formula One part two [edit]

Zanardi driving for Williams at the 1999 Canadian Grand Prix.

Zanardi's CART success caught the eye of Sir Frank Williams whom he made contact in 1997, to inform them he would be available for contract negotiations if needed. Williams visited Zanardi who signed a three-year contract in July 1998 which was publicly confirmed in September of that year.^[9] He began testing at the end of that year alongside test driver Juan Pablo Montoya. Zanardi also received offers from BAR and Honda.^[10] In Australia, Zanardi was 9th quickest in the first free practice session but had limited track time due to reliability issues and traffic in qualifying meant he could only start 15th. He showed promise in the warm-up with 6th but the race saw him crash out on lap 21. Moving on to Brazil, Zanardi once again experienced limited time on the track which was mainly due to engine issues. He started 16th and retired with a differential failure. Zanardi also incurred a $5,000 fine for speeding in the pit lane.^[7]

At Imola, his form improved with a start position of 10th. The race itself threw up a surprise for Zanardi. His car was suffering electronic issues and ran a steady 7th in the closing stages and ran over oil from Johnny Herbert's Stewart at the Villeneuve chicane and spun into the gravel. Zanardi out qualified Schumacher at Monaco by over half a second. More drama occurred on race day as the seat in his Williams broke off during the early stages of the race but he managed to finish 8th and last of the runners. In Spain, despite setting the 5th quickest lap in first free practice, a wrong set-up placed Zanardi 17th in qualifying. His car's gearbox seized after a pit stop. Similar problems occurred in Canada where Friday practice running was limited. Managing to out qualify Schumacher, Zanardi's race was incident filled. Whilst running in 8th, he spun off into the gravel trap early on and dropped to last. Further time was lost when leaving the pit lane during a safety car period and receiving a stop-go penalty. A further excursion occurred when an maneuver on Luca Badoer's Minardi ended with Zanardi crashing out.^[7]

The wet qualifying for the French Grand Prix saw him qualify 15th after the Williams team misread conditions and aquaplaned during the race. At Silverstone, Zanardi qualified 13th and finished 11th. In Austria, he started 14th. In the first part of the race, Zanardi's radio communications failed and around lap 33, his team hung out pit boards calling him in to pit but a battle with Pedro Diniz distracted the Italian and twice missed the board and eventually ran out of fuel. At the German Grand Prix, Zanardi qualified 14th due to a miscalculation for his position and incurred another pit lane speeding fine. In the race, a differential failure affected the engine and brakes forced a retirement. At Hungary, Zanardi reverted to using left-foot braking but suffered a third consecutive retirement from a differential failure having ran off the road earlier in the race. In Belgium, Zanardi started from 8th and the start saw him overtake Rubens Barrichello and Damon Hill into La Source. Zanardi ran as high as 4th before pitting and eventually finished 8th.^[7]

Zanardi at a Pre-Grand Prix test at Monza in 1999

In Monza, Zanardi had stunned the Formula One world by qualifying 4th ahead of team-mate Ralf Schumacher. He managed to overtake David Coulthard and Heinz-Harald Frentzen at the start. Frentzen took over 2nd from Zanardi at the Roggia chicane. On the third lap the floor on the Williams became loose and he was forced to wave his rivals past but managed to finish 7th. At the next round at the Nürburgring, Zanardi could only manage to qualify in 18th placing blame on traffic. He performed well at the start but was forced to take avoiding action when Alexander Wurz clipped Pedro Diniz. The incident left Zanardi in last position but he regained positions before his car succumbed to his engine stalling. The penultimate round in Malaysia had seen Zanardi start from 16th with a first-lap collision that damaged his front rim with a pit-stop preventing better progress. He later ran wide which caused damage to the car radiators and forced another pit-stop with Zanardi finishing 10th.^[7]

The final race of the season was in Japan where he qualified 16th. In the race, Zanardi overtook many of his rivals driving as high as 9th before his pit-lane limiter activated with the engine shutting off when he attempted to turn off the limiter on the first lap. At the end of the season, Zanardi and the Williams team decided to go their separate ways with an estimated cost of $4 million for the termination of Zanardi's contract.^[7]

Return to CART and Lausitzring crash [edit]

In the 2000 season Zanardi was not signed for a team, but was interested in a CART comeback. He tested for Mo Nunn in July at Sebring driving for 246 laps and opted to sign to the team for 2001, however he was not successful for the most part.^[7]

In his most competitive race of 2001, he suffered a violent accident at the EuroSpeedway Lausitz on 15 September. Zanardi started from the back of the grid and was gaining ground on his rivals. The crash occurred while Zanardi was leading the race in the closing laps. After a late pit stop, Zanardi was attempting to merge back onto the track when he accelerated abruptly and spun into the path of Patrick Carpentier. Carpentier was able to avoid him, but Alex Tagliani, who was just behind Carpentier at the time, could not and Zanardi's car was impacted from the side, behind the front wheel, severing the nose of the car.^[11] Zanardi lost both legs (one at and one above the knee) in the impact and nearly three-quarters of his blood volume, though rapid medical intervention saved his life. Further portions of his legs were amputated during three hours of surgery to clean and facilitate closing the wounds.^[12] This was the end of his open-wheel racing career.

Subsequent life and career [edit]

Zanardi was fitted with two prosthetic limbs and began an ambitious rehabilitation program. Dissatisfied with the limitations of legs available commercially, Zanardi designed and built his own bespoke legs, to allow him to compare the weight and stiffness of various feet in order to find the ones most suitable for racing. In 2002, CART honoured Zanardi by giving him the privilege of waving the checkered flag in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. In 2003, Zanardi was not only back behind the wheel, he was also racing again, with the aid of hand-operated brake and accelerator controls. He completed the final thirteen laps at the race track which had nearly killed him in 2001, and did so at highly competitive speeds approaching 310 km/h (193 mph). In fact, had he been qualifying for the race that weekend, he would have been fifth. It persuaded him that a race return was something to pursue.

Zanardi driving a BMW 320si WTCC car at Brands Hatch in 2008.

Zanardi competed at Monza, Italy, in his first race since the accident in a touring car modified to allow the use of his prosthetic feet, finishing the race in seventh. In 2004, Zanardi returned to racing full-time, driving for Roberto Ravaglia's BMW Team Italy-Spain in the FIA European Touring Car Championship. The season did not see him score many points, but for 2005 matters were much improved, in a series which became the World Touring Car Championship by adding two non-European races. On 24 August 2005, Zanardi won his first world series race since his accident at Lausitzring. He had taken advantage of the championship's reverse grid system, in which by finishing the weekend's first race in 8th, a driver starts the second on pole. Still, Zanardi had held off attacks from several drivers, and celebrated his win with a series of trademark "donuts". He then finished the season strongly. He took further wins at Istanbul in 2006 and Brno in 2008 and 2009. At the end of the 2009 season he announced his retirement from the WTCC.^[13]

Zanardi returned to a Formula One car in late November 2006 at a testing session for BMW Sauber in Valencia, Spain. The car had been specially adapted to have hand controls fitted on the steering wheel. After the drive Zanardi told the main problem he was having was using only his right hand to steer through corners, as his left operated the throttle.^[14] Zanardi was quoted as saying, "Of course, I know that I won't get a contract with the Formula One team, however having the chance to drive an F1 racer again is just incredible."^[15][16]

Since 2004, he has had his own range of kart chassis, called the Zanardi, which has been raced in the European KF1 Championship and World Championship as well as in many other racing events worldwide. Dutch driver Nyck de Vries has won the CIK-FIA Karting World Championship in 2010 and 2011 with Zanardi karts.

In 2007 he achieved 4th place in the New York City Marathon in the handcycle division,^[17] after only four weeks of training. He has since taken up handcycling in earnest, and competed at the Para-Cycling Road World Championships in 2009. He stated that he was targeting a place in the Italian team for the 2012 Summer Paralympics.^[18] In 2009 he won the Venice Marathon in the category for the disabled, riding his wheelchair in one hour, thirteen minutes, 56 seconds, and won the Rome City Marathon in 2010, in a time of one hour, fifteen minutes, 53 seconds.^[19] In 2011, at his fourth attempt, Zanardi won the New York City Marathon in his handcycling class.^[20]

On 5 September 2012, Zanardi won a gold medal in the men's road time trial H4 at the 2012 Paralympic Games in London,^[21][22] finishing 27.14 seconds ahead of Nobert Mosandi.^[23] Afterwards he stated he would be interested in returning to auto racing for the 2013 Indianapolis 500.^[24]

Alex Zanardi at the 1998 CART grand prix in Laguna Seca

Subsequently in November 2012 Zanardi tested a BMW DTM touring car, completing 32 laps of the Nürburgring.^[25]

In December 2012, Zanardi was named one of "The Men of the Year 2012" by Top Gear for keeping calm and carrying on, despite everything.^{[citation needed]}

Personal life [edit]

Zanardi has been married to Daniela (née Manni) since 1996, and they have a son, Niccolò (born 7 September 1998).^[7] He has co-written two books based on his life, Alex Zanardi: My Story (2004) and Alex Zanardi: My Sweetest Victory (2004). Zanardi and his story have been featured on the HBO sports series Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel.

Helmet [edit]

Zanardi's helmet is silver with a blue shape around the visor. The chin area is grey with a silver grid, a yellow line runs across the back of the helmet near the blue shape of the visor, a red line runs under the top and there is a pineapple on the rear (an allusion to his nickname).

Zanardi Edition NSX [edit]

Alex Zanardi Edition Acura NSX, basically a Japanese Honda NSX Type S variant, was introduced in 1999 for the U.S. market to commemorate his two back-to-back championship wins in 1997 and 1998 in the North American CART Champ Car open wheel racing series. Only 51 examples were ever built, and all were painted New Formula Red to reflect the color of the Champ Car he drove to 2 titles for Chip Ganassi Racing. Number 0 was a press car, while number 1 was a gift from Acura/Honda to Zanardi himself. Numbers 2 through 50 were sold to the general public through Acura dealerships across the nation.

Racing record [edit]

Complete International Formula 3000 results [edit]

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)

Complete Formula One results [edit]

(key)

American open-wheel racing results [edit]

CART [edit]

(key)

Complete World Touring Car Championship results [edit]

(key) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in italics indicate fastest lap)

References [edit]

External links [edit]

• Alex Zanardi official website
• Full Profile on Formula One Rejects
• Career information at Driver Database
• Alex Zanardi's preparation for the London 2012 Paralympic Games
• London 2012 Profile
• Media related to Alex Zanardi at Wikimedia Commons

v t e Minardi F1 Team Founder Giancarlo Minardi Owners Flavio Briatore (1996) Gabriele Rumi (1996–2000) Paul Stoddart (2001–2005) Personnel Andy Bendell Gustav Brunner Giacomo Caliri Aldo Costa Gabriele Tredozi Notable drivers (See all) Christijan Albers Michele Alboreto Luca Badoer Adrián Campos Andrea de Cesaris Anthony Davidson Christian Fittipaldi Marc Gené Pedro Lamy Tarso Marques Pierluigi Martini Gianni Morbidelli Roberto Moreno Luis Pérez-Sala Jos Verstappen Justin Wilson Alex Yoong Alessandro Zanardi Notable rookies Alessandro Nannini Giancarlo Fisichella Jarno Trulli Fernando Alonso Mark Webber Formula One cars M185 M185B M186 M187 M188 M188B M189 M190 M191 M192 M193 M193B M194 M195 M195B M197 M198 M01 M02 PS01 PS02 PS03 PS04 PS04B PS05

v t e Team Lotus Founder Colin Chapman Noted personnel Frank Dernie Gérard Ducarouge Maurice Philippe Peter Warr Peter Wright World Champions Mario Andretti Jim Clark Emerson Fittipaldi Graham Hill Jochen Rindt Other notable drivers Elio de Angelis Mika Häkkinen Johnny Herbert Nigel Mansell Gunnar Nilsson Ronnie Peterson Nelson Piquet Carlos Reutemann Ayrton Senna Alex Zanardi Formula One cars 16 18 21 24 25 33 43 49 56B 63 72 76 77 78 79 80 81 86 87 88 91 92 93T 94T 95T 97T 98T 99T 100T 101 102 107 109 112 Formula Two cars 12 16 18 32 35 41 44 48 59 69 Formula Three cars 22 31 35 41 55 59 69 Formula Junior cars 18 20 22 27 Formula Ford cars 51 59 61 69 Formula 5000 cars 68 70 Tasman Series cars 32 39 67 Indianapolis 500 cars 29 34 38 42 56 64 96T Sports racing cars 15 17 19 23 30 40 47 53