Zanardi: Lausitz return holds no fear.

Alex Zanardi has admitted that returning to the EuroSpeedway Lausitz in Germany next month will not hold any psychological problems for him, despite it being the track where he lost both legs and very nearly his life.

The charismatic Italian has been invited to act as grand marshal for the German 500 in May, and is actually looking forward to returning to the European oval, eighteen months on from the fateful accident which saw him crash out of the lead of the event with dramatic consequences.

"I'm very, very proud to come back and to be named grand marshal for the event - CART has given me a very, very big honour by doing this," Zanardi insisted, "But I don't think I'm going to have any problems because that moment, psychologically, happened a very, very long time ago. Mentally, I've walked around that circuit already a year ago, at least.

"Obviously, there will be something going through my mind - I wouldn't be human otherwise, I guess. But, quite frankly, I feel that, psychologically, the accident is definitely behind me.

"I'm a very optimistic person. When I came home, when I found myself playing with the remote control of the television on the wheelchair - I felt kind of miserable sometimes. I also thought about the days where I could just go out, fool around or go for a ride with my bicycle and things like that, but I stayed very little on that attitude. Fortunately, I've met people along the way that helped me a lot, technically speaking, as well, to put my life back together, and it didn't take long for me to be completely over that.

"Now, I wake up in the morning and the way I see life is simply as it is. I organise myself to achieve what I want to. Yes, sure, there are things I can't do anymore, but there are others that I do thanks to what happened to me. I don't think the feelings that I will have driving into Lausitzring with my rental car will be feelings of fear. It will probably be more feelings of pride to say 'you didn't do me this time'. I'm still going to be very proud to go back to that place and probably this time leave the place with a smile on my face, hopefully."

The US rumour mill, on hearing that Zanardi was going to be involved in the German event, began to speculate exactly what his role would entail - something that the Italian was quick to put right.

"I let it slip out of my lips that I'm going to try to bring a surprise and, therefore, people are drawing conclusions - everybody is saying that I'm probably going to drive something," he revealed, "The speculation that I heard today went from driving the pace car to competing in the main event!

"Again, I'm honoured that I'm still news and that people are still interested in my progress. And, again, I'm very honoured to serve the role of grand marshal for the event. It would be exciting for me to put my helmet on and compete in the main event but, unfortunately, this won't be the case. It will simply be a joy for me to watch all of my friends in the CART community and again be close to the fans that supported me."