Alessandro Zanardi, b. October 23, 1966 in Bologna, Italy, was a race car driver during the 1990's who had success in Formula 3000 and greater success CART, but mysteriously struggled in Formula 1.
Like a lot of successful open-wheel racers, Zanardi got his start in karting. He raced karts until around 1988, when he joined the Italian Formula 3 series on a full-time basis. By 1990, he was a contender for the series championship and was ready to move on to higher levels of competitions.
Alessandro made his biggest strides in 1991, when he debuted in F3000 fulltime on the Il Barone Rampante team, themselves newcomers to the series. In the team's first race, Zanardi emerged victorious. It was one of three victories that Zanardi had that season as he quickly became a name to watch. He was fast, he was calm, and he showed an impressive knowledge of what his car was doing, which made him an engineer's dream. He barely lost the F3000 championship that season to Christian Fittipaldi, but in that same year, he was able to make his F1 debut with Jordan, who needed a replacement for a young driver named Michael Schumacher. In his two races with the team, he continued to showcase his F3000 form, but team principal Eddie Jordan was unable to keep him after the end of the season.
The charismatic Zanardi was out of a job for most of 1992, but did spend time as an injury replacement for Fittipaldi, now driving for Minardi in his first F1 season. He made three attempts driving for them, missing the field twice and lasting one lap in the once race he did make, but it was as much due to the car as anything else.
Alessandro tested with the Benetton team during the offseason, but Lotus was quicker on the draw and signed him to a contract for 1993 when Mika Hakkinen left for Williams. He was as fast as teammate Johnny Herbert and was important in sorting out the team's active suspension system. In that season's Brazilian Grand Prix, Zanardi scored his first point in F1 with a 6th place finish. However, Zanardi's season was cut short after a bad accident during practice for the Belgian Grand Prix.
He missed the start of the 1994 season, but returned in Spain that year. However, the Lotus was highly unreliable, and the team was on a sharp decline. Zanardi failed to score a point in his time back, and the team collapsed at the end of the year. After a brief time in sportscars during 1995, he was given a test for CART by Adrian Reynard, with whom he'd had a great relationship with.
He earned a spot racing for Chip Ganassi in 1996 and Alex, as he was now more commonly known, became an instant hit in CART with his driving skills. He was instantly one of the series' most popular drivers. His rookie season resulted in 3 victories, 2nd place in the championship behind teammate Jimmy Vasser, and was easily named CART rookie of the year. Zanardi kept up the momentum from 1996 in the next two seasons, winning 12 races for Ganassi and taking the championship in 1997 and 1998.
During this time, Zanardi celebrated most of his victories by spinning the car around in tight circles, aka doing "donuts". It was loved by the fans and has become a popular means of celebrating in a variety of racing series all across America.
Zanardi's CART success led for his biggest F1 opportunity yet when Williams gave him a 3-year contract in 1999. In pre-season testing, he was fast but everything seemed to go wrong afterwards. For whatever reason, Alex was unable to have success while his teammate Ralf Schumacher was. Whether it was because of his car, the engineers, personal issues, or something else is not totally clear, but when all was said and done, Zanardi failed to score a single point. Williams terminated his contract after one year and replaced him with rookie Jenson Button.
He rejoined CART in 2001 driving for Mo Nunn. Nunn's racing team was not quite at the calibre of Ganassi's, but he had his moments. However, his racing career appeared to come to a shocking halt on September 15, 2001 when, with 13 laps to go, he was involved in his frightening accident with Alex Tagliani at the EuroSpeedway in Germany. The incident was nearly fatal but Zanardi survived, however the crash caused him to lose both of his legs.
Alex was fitted with two prosthetic legs, and reappeared on the CART scene in 2002, waving the green and checkered flags in Toronto. Remarkably, in 2003, Zanardi was not only back behind the wheel but was racing cars again. With the aid of a hand operated brake and accelerator, he drove the final 13 laps at the track which nearly killed him in an emotional pre-race festivity before a Champ Car (previous CART) race, and did so at a highly competitive speed.
Zanardi then took the wheel of a sports car at Monza in October, which was modified to allow him to use his prosthetic foot to brake. Not only did he finish the race but was a competitive 7th place after starting near the back of the field.
