rec.autos.simulators

-John

It won't let me in with Netscape 4.77...

I'm not sure I want to use such a chauvanistic site<grin>.

Todd

  Well all the fancy doodads make the screens load slower now...  Glad I'm
not dialup.
dave henrie

--
don

-------------------------------------
                    BAPOM
Alternative Program Covers for GPL
   http://www.trilon.com/bapom/

Back on topic, I take it that Zanardi is healing and doing OK these days??

"Doug Milliken"> Back on topic, I take it that Zanardi is healing and doing
OK these days??

taken from speedtv's site...just for the slow of modem:
A Conversation With Alex Zanardi

By: Eric Mauk

Monte Carlo, Monaco, February 19

Alex Zanardi recently completed six weeks of rehabilitation at the INAIL
Medical Center in Budrio, Italy, making another step up in his progress
after his horrific accident that caused the amputation of both of his legs
during a CART FedEx Championship Series event last season.

He returned to his Monte Carlo home last Friday and has been up and around
walking for the last couple of months, and has taken the time to give his
fans an update on what he has been doing and how he is progressing. He is
hoping to be able to attend the CART event in Long Beach, but has yet to
make a decision on the trip.

What follows is a transcript of a conversation with Zanardi, given to us by
Mo Nunn Racing's public relations chief Laz Denes.

"I'm back home in Monte Carlo, basically taking advantage of all the things
I have learned in the last six weeks, and utilizing those things in my
journey back to a normal life. I'm certainly not very fast, but I'm
conducting a normal life and I'm really, really happy about that. Right now,
my day is about going to the supermarket, going to the bank, going to pick
up my son at school. Just yesterday, I bought my first pair of shoes since
the accident. A pair of sport shoes, nothing fancy. Right now, normally you
go into the store and check the comfort of the shoes. I go in and check the
mechanics of the shoes, to make sure I can walk in them. It was a little
embarrassing, at first, because the lady in the shop didn't know anything
about me. So I had to explain a little bit. I was served. I had what I
wanted.

"It will never be exactly as it was before, but if I work hard, we'll get
close. I've been through many, many sets of artificial legs. The ones I'm
wearing now are, basically, two pieces. One piece is made of a special
plastic similar to Teflon, and another piece which is the frame, which is
the stiff part, which is outside. The frame was made a few weeks ago and the
inside has been adapted to it as we went along. It's easier to adapt the
inside, to modify the mold, and put this outside piece on it. You heat it up
and it will shrink a little. They change the shape, not dramatically, but to
be the way you want. The frame outside is a little bigger. It has spacers to
keep it in place. I'm going to go back and make a new frame for the molds
and it should be ready for when I go back. That's the way it goes.

"For sure, in the first year, I'm going to go back to this center many, many
times, just to do this and that, just to make slight modifications to my
artificial legs, or to get new things that I need to do something in
particular. Eventually, I'm just going to go less and less for checkups. The
good thing is that the toughest part is behind me, which was to learn how to
use and how to walk with the legs and how to walk correctly. Now, it's just
to go back and make sure, on my own, that I haven't developed any bad
habits, so I'm still doing all the movements in a correct way.

"It'll take, for sure, some more time before I can say I don't have much to
learn anymore. I still have a lot to learn, but nothing that cannot be
learned by living a normal life. Obviously, it's just like skiing. You put
the skis on the first time, and it feels like it's impossible that you can
ever do anything close to what you see on television when athletes come down
the runs. But then, eventually, if you have a certain aptitude, you develop
control. But the learning curve never really reaches a flat spot... you're
always learning. Eventually, you come to a flat spot, but you can always do
even better and better and better. Right now, every day I learn something.

"The other day I drove from Bologna back to here. It was great. I went and
bought a sandwich, and I filled the car with gas... all the things when
people stop and see me they say 'wow.' They think of me as a guy who just
five months ago lost his legs and was closer to death than to life, and they
see me at this point doing quite well. I understand that for people who
haven't seen me in a long time, that's impressive, and I'm proud of that.

"I'd love to go to Long Beach. I would love to go. The only problem right
now is that I am only at the beginning of my rehab. I am four or five months
ahead of where I should be, but it's also true that my legs, my limbs, were
badly hurt just not so long ago. So, there are days when everything is
perfect, where I can walk kilometers and stay on my legs all day long.
Yesterday was a good day. I went on my own to a big sports store with
escalators and I went up on my own. Later I went to pick up my son. Later in
the day I went to Venti Milla, the village in Italy just across the border,
to do some shopping. It was a good day and I wore my legs all day. But just
the day before I had pain in my left leg due to a process that is evolving
called calcification, and sometimes it hurts very badly. So, those days,
it's hard to take just a few steps. Other days, it's funny because I put my
legs on and they don't feel right, and this thing can last the entire
morning. It's a normal part of the evolution I am going through.
Unfortunately, right now it's not predictable when these days will happen.
This is the reason I hesitate to take a trip for so long.

"The good thing is that I've turned the first page of that book. Actually,
I've finished the first chapter. All of the others are very, very short. So
when I go back, it's going to be very, very short. Not two months like it
was this time. I've learned the basics. It's now up to me to develop a
normal life. Otherwise, I only go back to the medical center if I need
something, technically, or if I need new components.

"I think, for sure that's been great. I've played a role in my quick
recovery with the fact that I've been able to come back, to help develop my
own artificial limbs. Sometimes you try really hard to do something, like
walk without crutches, and you don't succeed. And then, eventually, you give
a turn of a screwdriver to your knee and, magically, it works. And now I can
walk without crutches. I'm just going around with a cane for more comfort
and more safety, so I don't do anything silly. If I wanted to go around
without a cane, it's a great achievement in the game. I'm developing my
equipment. I'll probably be able to do that more and more and more.

"The fact that I've faced the tuning of my legs in a way, at the same level
of, developing a race car, it's helped a lot. Now, I know a lot of things
about not only mechanical knees or the way they work, but, for instance, how
to change a foot. It sounds funny, but it makes so much of a difference.
After a few weeks of rehabilitation, it was per my request that I try a
different foot with the characteristics that I wanted. I made a huge step
forward thanks to that. Just by changing the flexibility of a foot, in a
particular part, I wanted it to be more flexible. I was able not so much to
improve my walking on a hard surface, but to do stairs, and especially to
walk on grass, where the surface is a little rough. It was a difference like
night and day whether I could be totally independent and walk in a perfectly
safe way, where before I always had to have my physiotherapist with me all
the way. What I'm saying is that sometimes the components, they make a big,
big difference. I think my quick, quick recovery is because I was able to
talk to the technician."