It could always be worse

Immutable – ĭ-myoo͞′tə-bəl

1. not subject to change
2. unalterable
3. the manner in which Alex Zanardi’s fighting spirit can change form but never be destroyed.

In my previous entry, in a somewhat out of place appearance, were the words “someone always has it harder than you.” I suppose, deep down, I am hopeful that a prospective racing driver someday comes upon this isolated corner of the worldwide web and reads…something, anything, that is useful to them in some small way. In the hopes such a scenario comes to pass, especially considering the preceding two posts on inspirational figures, I believe just one more such post before getting back on the subject of this blog is in order. This time, the subject of this digital word vomit is none other than the incredible Alex Zanardi.

Admittedly, given the title of this post and the subject of this blog, there are certainly many, many examples of people who have to endure through much harder times than prospective racing drivers. The average man, doing what it is that he has to do and not what he wants to do has it much harder than most athletes. Though, when someone is on the ferocious pursuit of a singular goal, athletes tend to lose touch with reality somewhat as they live in hyper-focused bubbles. In those cases, it helps to consider people within the context of one’s own sport. Potentially hard for the average person to comprehend, but competitive athletes will know where this post and the two preceding it are coming from. Anyone who has faced and overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles can be an unending reservoir of nonpareil inspiration.

After building a kart from dustbins and repurposed piping from his father’s shop, Alex Zanardi began his competitive racing career at the age of thirteen, the same year he lost his sister in an automobile accident. Progressing to Formula Three at twenty-two years of age was possible only after the Papis family helped financially. A bit of a latecomer in both of those categories, he did find his way into Formula 3000 in 1991. By the end of that season, he added two F1 Grand Prix finishes from three starts to his name, replacing Roberto Moreno at Footwork. He completed a single Grand Prix in 1992 while playing the role of test driver for Benetton. Winding up at Lotus for the 1993 season, he managed to secure a point at the Brazilian Grand Prix. He probably would have fared much better had he not suffered a broken foot in a road cycling accident, followed up by a season-ending concussion at the Belgian Grand Prix.

Zanardi spent 1994 recovering and testing for Lotus, filling in for a single race at Catalunya before Lotus folded in 1995. Zanardi did his best to keep sharp in a Porsche Supercup, but his Grand Prix career ended after a tumultuous few seasons. Zanardi did manage his way into CART and spent the 1995 season as a test driver. The full time ride followed in 1996. That is, despite Chip Ganassi’s race engineer, Mo Nunn, attempting to curtail his signing, citing Italian drivers supposed inclination to unforced errors. What is it about race engineers? Imagine making such a suggestion about someone coming from Formula One. A rough start to the series turned in the latter half and ended with three race wins. The next season he immediately found success, culminating in two straight CART titles in 1997 and 1998.

Zanardi successfully converted his American single seater success into a return to Formula One, something near impossible nowadays. Unfortunately success was harder to come by in his return to racing’s top tier, and despite signing a three-year contract he took a four million dollar pay day in exchange for mutual termination of his contract with Williams. After spending the 2000 season without a drive, a CART comeback was on the horizon for the 2001 season.

At this point in the blog, some readers will agree it was probably an injustice to have glazed over his racing career in such a way. After all, Zanardi was a late entrant to karting after a tragic family event and a late entrant to Formula Three. Still, he made it to the top of the motor racing pyramid as depicted on this blog. Sure, his first trip there was a bit of a turbulent experience, but after finding Formula One’s exit he still found title success, dominating the single seater scene in the United States. He did what few drivers have managed to do, and reached the pinnacle of motor racing twice. In the end he did unceremoniously find the exit once again, though his racing career deserves respect and should be admired. After all, he went through his fair share of tribulations throughout his career and became a multiple championship winning driver despite them.

This post is not about Alex Zanardi the racing driver, though. This post is about Alex Zanardi the person.

Upon his return to the CART series, Alex Zanardi only managed to finish races in the top ten a handful of times. His best result was a fourth place finish in Toronto. By the time the series made its way to the Lausitzring in Germany for the fifteenth round, and despite qualifying at the back, Zanardi was leading near the end of the race and appeared to be on his way to securing the first race win of the season.

Zanardi pitted in the late stages of the race but upon re-entering the track, potentially in an unsuccessful attempt to rapidly warm his tires, Zanardi lost control of his vehicle. His car spun across the grass, coming to a standstill on the other side of the track and directly on the racing line, into the path of the oncoming Patrick Carpentier and Alex Tagliani. While Carpentier managed to avoid colliding with Zanardi’s car at the last possible moment, Tagliani was unable to avoid impact. At over two hundred miles per hour, Tagliani’s car ripped through Zanardi’s, essentially cutting the car in half, dismembering Alex Zanardi’s legs in the process. One of his legs had been torn at the knee while the other was torn above the knee, his pelvis was fractured, and he lacerated his liver.

Doctors Steve Olvey and Terry Trammell were first on the scene, the latter slipping on what he thought was lubricant from the racecar. It turned out he slipped on the blood of Alex Zanardi as he was rapidly exsanguinating. Zanardi was air lifted to a hospital in Berlin and underwent a three hour initial surgery to save his life. He was read the last rights, as his heart stopped seven times. Somehow, in spite of losing all but a liter of his blood in the incident, Zanardi clung to his life.

Zanardi spent the next week in a coma, and described a key moment after waking up. His wife told him what happened, that he had lost his legs, but the important thing was that he was alive. He apparently answered that he was exceptionally tired and just wanted to sleep, but not to worry about his legs, assuring his wife that “we will find a way.” Over the next forty-six days he underwent fifteen additional surgeries..

I find Alex Zanardi’s attitude nothing short of remarkable, as over the subsequent rehabilitation process, he never cried once, never let self pity get in the way of that process. He remained ever the eternal optimist. He was simply..happy to be alive. Instead of asking how he was going to live without legs he adopted the mind frame that things could only get better, and instead he asked himself how he was going to keep doing all the things he wanted to do, the things he had to do, without legs. After waking up and realizing he had narrowly escaped death by a hair’s length, he affirmed to himself that his predicament was a matter of perspective. He contends that one is much more welcoming to challenges after such an event. He was more curious than depressed, and that curiosity opened the doors to new challenges for him which he embraced..

Once stabilized, Zanardi returned to Bologna in order to learn how to walk again with the assistance of prosthetic legs. At the time, doctors estimated it would take approximately eighteen months before he could regain some independence. It took Zanardi only three months to reach that level of independence. In fact, he drove himself and his family from Bologna to his home in Monaco upon completion of rehabilitation. I can only imagine how affirming this was to Zanardi’s attitude; if he was able to overcome such serious life-lasting injuries, he could overcome anything should something similar ever happen again..

I recall seeing an interview about a year or so after his crash, in which Zanardi was posed a question about if or what he thought about an incident of this magnitude ever happening to him beforehand. He responded that before the incident when considering if such massive injuries were to occur, he would simply resign to killing himself. He said this was especially his mindset after seeing Born On The Fourth Of July, a movie which made him feel a great sense of pity for the main character suffering without his legs.

His response spoke to me, as admittedly when risks eventually became more serious for me, and make no mistake I was keenly aware of them from moment one, I told myself that I too would just kill myself rather than become a burden to anyone in my life. That was how I accepted certain risks at a certain time, because if someone involved in a sport like this is only ever considering risks, they never reach their maximum level of performance anyway.

Nevertheless, Zanardi explained that his baseline level of happiness was already incredibly high before his major accident at the Lausitzring. As we often see with people going through such a traumatic experience, he eventually returned to the same baseline level of happiness. From the perspective of a healthy and able-bodied athlete, it always seems impossible, so I am always fascinated by this phenomenon. It just goes to show how important being happy is in the first place.

In other words, the champion’s attitude of Alex Zanardi survived his horrific crash as well. While none of this is surprising in hindsight, I am still thoroughly amazed by him all these years later.

As incredible as Alex Zanardi’s attitude and relentless fighting spirit was, I can only imagine the overwhelming loss of purpose someone would feel losing his career after dedicating a lifetime to reaching Formula 1 and CART. When Zanardi regained his mobility, and therefore interacted with people more similarly to before the accident, he was often asked if he would get back into racing. Understandably, his complete priority was gaining his independence back, not initially worrying about racing.

Eventually, Zanardi did return to piloting a CART. He returned to the same track where his life-altering accident took place, and finished the thirteen laps remaining in the race, utilizing hand controls in place of accelerator and brake pedals. I would totally understand if someone decided to leave racing entirely and accept that it was not possible without legs. Ever the glass half-full optimist, he believed that in the worst case scenario another such incident would not break his legs; he would simply require a screwdriver.

Zanardi possessed an intense self belief and knew he would be the same driver should it ever be technologically possible to pilot a race car again. While he was initially tickled he could choose his own height with respect to his prosthetics, he ended up scrapping the commercially available version and designed his own after experimenting with which materials might be most appropriate for a return to racing.

He proved that he was the same driver by winning again – a mere eighteen months after his accident – and he kept winning. Zanardi raced in the FIA European Touring Car Championship, DTM, Blancpain Endurance, and the WTCC securing ten podiums and four victories. Truly outstanding, especially considering the amount of “feel” that may have been lost, as when he started racing again he was originally using his prosthetic leg to apply brake pressure. Zanardi’s champion attitude screams loudly to me; if the opportunity was available he always decided to go for it.

While I cannot speak for Zanardi, I have to believe that part of his incredible return to racing was the result of his baseline happiness level – which is why it is so important for prospective racing drivers to ensure racing is not the only thing in their lives. The pursuit of a goal requires dedication and focus, but racing just cannot be the only thing in one’s life as alluded to on this blog previously. Zanardi was a family man, and felt the zest for life as all champions do. It is truly a requisite ingredient for finding purpose.

Zanardi found new purpose soon after returning to racing. After just a month of training on a hand-cycle, he narrowly missed out on a podium at his first race. Throughout 2008 and 2009 he trained more seriously and set his sights on representing Italy at the London 2012 Paralympics, competing in various marathons and the World Championships along the way. Amazingly, Zanardi won two gold medals and a silver at the 2012 Games in London, and became the UCI Para-Cycling World Champion in 2013.

Yet another return to racing was made by Zanardi, this time making use of a hand operating accelerator lever behind the wheel. Behind that was a normal gear-up paddle shifter. His right hand was operating a brake lever which had a downshift trigger on the grip section. Zanardi, never the slouch, was able to apply two hundred and twenty kilograms of force through the lever upon returning to DTM in 2018. Thanks to these new hand controls the normal pedal box could be left as normal for teammates, clearing the way for Zanardi to return to endurance racing in 2019. I have so much respect for this guy’s skill level. I imagine it was much tougher to control and collect a GTE car on the limit in such a manner, and it really speaks to how capable of a driver Alex Zanardi is, something his F1 career unfairly may not have suggested.

Two additional gold medals and a silver medal were added at the 2016 Games in Brazil – at the age of forty-nine, might I add; proving not just that adversity can make way for incredible opportunities in the future, but that age truly is just a number. Incredible when you think that Zanardi to this day refers to his accident as the greatest opportunity he ever had, because everything he accomplished thereafter was directly the result of losing his legs. All those accomplishments, and he still refers to himself as lazy..

How? How was this possible? How can a racing driver lose his legs….make a racing comeback, a winning one at that….and simultaneously pivot to a new sport, eventually becoming World and Paralympic champion?

According to Zanardi it came down to curiosity..

“I guess, curiosity is all you need in life. If you are curious enough you are going to find your passions….and when you find your passions, I mean, it’s just gonna be – everything is going to be so natural, and even if the results you get whether they’re big or small are just the logical consequence of how much passion you put in your daily routine in building up, you know, you can take every day as opportunity to add something to your life. And day after day, you may end up in London winning a gold medal.

..but to the writer it sounds more like what happens when an ever-optimistic attitude meets a relentless work ethic, which just so happen to be two of the requisite ingredients in a champion’s attitude. I postulate Zanardi’s results in multiple sports are the result of a potent mixture; a champion’s attitude and the sort of tenacious internal drive that keeps moving goalposts. You know the kind. The sort that perpetually keeps one’s ambition always higher than his capabilities.

So what can the prospective racing driver of the future, who I imagine stumbling in here one day, learn from this great man?

Absolutely nothing is more important than possessing and cultivating a champion’s attitude. Having a goal in life is the greatest gift one can receive. Having a goal you cherish, which you have so much passion for…it is exciting. It makes you feel the zest for life, it keeps gratitude alive inside. He said it best himself, after winning a goal at the 2014 Paralympics, “I feel very lucky, my life is a never-ending privilege.”

Zanardi was competing at the Obietto Tri Colore in June of 2020 when he struck an oncoming truck, sustaining severe head injuries and facial fractures. He underwent several facial reconstruction surgeries and by December he had regained his sight and hearing. By January he was speaking again, and by the end of 2021 he was well enough to continue his rehabilitation back at home.

None of this surprises me. Over and over, Alex Zanardi has been in a fight for his life, battling seemingly insurmountable odds. Yet again and again, Alex Zanardi comes back with an indomitable fighting spirit.

Why?

Alex Zanardi possesses not just a winner’s attitude, but the champion’s attitude…

..and the attitude of a champion is simply immutable.