LONG BEACH, California – Alex Zanardi has been invited back to the Long Beach Grand Prix time and time again in whatever official racing role he wants.
The Italian had been told he would be inducted into the Walk of Fame, but Zanardi was always too busy. Train for the Paralympics, host his famous talk show or simply content to inspire others to never give up on their life journey.
Tired of waiting to pay tribute to the beloved athlete, race promoter Jim Michaelian placed Zanardi in 16th place on the Walk of Fame absentee Thursday. Zanardi is recuperating in Italy since a truck crash in 2020 while competing in a race on his scooter.
“We felt it was time to get Alex the recognition he deserves,” Michaelian said.
He was honored by former team owner Chip Ganassi, former teammates Jimmy Vasser and Max Papis, his childhood friend from Italy and current member of race control IndyCar. The trio shared heartfelt memories of Zanardi, a two-time series champion and winner of 15 races over four seasons.
Zanardi lost both legs in a 2001 accident in Germany but then began a second career as a manual clutch driver. He has won six Paralympic medals – four golds – in London and Rio. Zanardi never let the loss of his legs falter.
“I think I spoke to him once about the accident,” Ganassi said. “And then his life went on. We never talked about his feet again. We all thought it was the end of a great career, and we didn’t. realized that it wasn’t the end of one career, but the beginning of another great one. Together Alex built a life that 10 men couldn’t achieve.”
Michaelian notes that Zanardi, a two-time Long Beach winner in four career starts, invented the burnout victory after his 1997 win. The donut that day was rough, but Zanardi perfected the celebration over five victories that year; Today, post-race burnout is a tradition in American motorsport.
“It was like half a donut, it was terrible. But he practiced a lot that year and started perfecting it,” says Vasser. “And all the praise he’s received for that is incredible. The fans will come to us with boxes of donuts at the track.”
The Long Beach win for Zanardi was the second in a run of four consecutive wins by the Ganassi drivers started by Vasser in 1996, consecutive wins by Zanardi and then Juan Pablo Montoya in 1999. This three also had four consecutive championships for Ganassi during that time period.
In 1997, when Zanardi started making donuts, Vasser was the defending champion and struggled with a winless season. Vasser admits that “the donuts are starting to get a bit annoying for me”.
Zanardi keeps his teammates motivated by trying to get Vasser to plan his own victory celebration, and Vasser jokes that he’ll crash Ganassi’s car into the wall when he finally wins on 1997. Vasser’s victory came in the season finale at Laguna Seca, where Zanardi finished second and won the championship.
“I was going down to the corkscrew and he pulled me along and he waved wildly. I thought, ‘That’s great, he’s happy for me,'” said Vasser. “But what he’s doing is this. waved, “This is the last corner! You haven’t hit the car yet!” So he lunged at me and ran me into the wall and helped me crash the car.
“So it was the celebration. It was just the best time of my life.”
Zanardi in 2019 competed his first Rolex 24 at the Daytona motorsport in a BMW with a specially developed steering wheel and manual controls. At the time, he said he was training for the Tokyo Olympics in 2020.
But the man who knows no bounds was injured in June 2020 during a clutch race in Siena, Italy. Zanardi suffered a severe head injury after plunging into oncoming traffic and was hospitalized for 18 months before his wife, Daniela, brought him home.
“Recovery continues to be a long process. Sometimes you have to take two steps back to take another step forward. But Alex has proven time and time again that he is a real boxer,” Daniela said. said in the quote provided by BMW earlier. five.
She said that COVID-19 was carried out during 18 months of isolation in the hospital.
“It’s important for him to be back with his family and in his familiar surroundings,” she said. “You also have to consider that, due to the Corona situation, Alex only had people wearing masks and protective equipment around him for a year and a half. In addition, due to the comprehensive and important protective measures in the clinic, of course, access is very limited.”
Papis is in regular contact with Daniela Zanardi and passes updates on to the IndyCar community emotionally invested in their heroic driver. He recalled on Thursday that he had been racing for Zanardi’s place in Germany before the accident, and when he visited him in the hospital, Zanardi was fixed on the shoes Papis was wearing.
“He asked if they were new, I said, ‘I bought them two weeks ago,’ and he said, ‘You see! It’s a good thing! What happened to me, I won’t have to spend money on new shoes, How can you fit that? ‘” “His life changed the lives of so many, especially in Italy. After the accident, he showed everyone that you can have another life even in the face of adversity.
“He’s going through another adversity, but I know no one better than him to prove you’re not done when a curved sphere is thrown at you. You react to it, and you make the thing. else happens, that’s what Alex does.”
