Alex Zanardi Quotes

The poster boy for our superabled future is Oscar Pistorius, an increasingly famous South African sprinter who happens to have had both of his legs amputated below the knee. Using upside down question mark-shaped carbon fiber sprinting prosthetics, called Cheetah blades, Mr. Pistorius can challenge the fastest sprinters in the world.

The prostheses do not run the race on their own: there is an athlete who does the work, and the prosthetics do not make a significant difference to the time.

After I lost my legs, all I wanted to do was snowboard again. I remember spending an entire year on the computer, looking for 'adaptive snowboarders' or 'snowboard legs' or 'adaptive snowboard schools' or just something that I could connect to. I already knew how to snowboard - I just needed to find the right legs.

I'm afraid they've left their legs at home.

It's factual to say I am a bilateral-below-the-knee amputee. I think it's subjective opinion as to whether or not I am disabled because of that. That's just me.

I've had journalists asking me, 'What do we call you - is it handicapped, are you disabled, physically challenged?' I said, 'Well hopefully you could just call me Aimee. But if you have to describe it, I'm a bilateral below-the-knee amputee.'

My hope is to be the first disabled swimmer on an able-bodied team at the Y Nationals.

When I returned to the Touring Car championship, I got the team to create a special brake pedal that I could use with my prosthetic leg.

Having already used a Fox shock in my Moto Knee, the prosthetic leg I developed, I knew that I would take advantage of Fox's superior suspension dynamics in the Versa Foot as well.

I am the owner of my prosthetic manufacturing business, BioDapt, which manufactures lower-limb prosthetics for sports.

I think it's phenomenal and expected that Paralympians will take on able bodied people more and more. In dressage, it happens all the time. But there are very few adaptions, and they are never allowed to give you an advantage.

The biggest challenge during competition is keeping my real legs warm with clothing, because I have poor circulation in the tissue around the amputated areas.

In para-cycling I am a veteran with Olympic medals now.

When you lose your hands, you can't play baseball.

Paralympics... fascinating because just watching anyone with a major disability trying to do everyday chores is fun to watch.

The other night I was playing twister with some amputees.

When I got hurt and had surgery on my left shoulder, my arm was in a sling for over a month but I could play Ping-Pong right-handed. I started playing and got addicted.

I've had versions of disability my whole life, first with my hearing and then when I couldn't walk for over a year.

It's an amazing feeling when I have a customer who tries a leg on and is able to go snowboarding for the first time.

To be able to wear your country's colors and compete in the Paralympics for the snowboard team... it's pretty powerful.

Having adaptive events televised in the X Games is huge. There are people out there who might want to do this but don't think they can. They can see us out here tearing it up. That's going to help people realize that if you want something bad enough, you can get there.

Using KERS and the adjustable front wing is not particularly difficult. Once you've worked out where to use KERS to optimum effect at each track, and in which places you adjust the front wing, it happens pretty much automatically.

Snowboarding and skiing are big adaptive sports, so that's kind of a market that I wanted to make our equipment used for.

I have always had a very smooth driving style. But when I started competing as a disabled driver, I had to take that even more to the extreme.

I wear my prosthetics legs every day, and when I train in the gym, I call them my Lamborghini, because both legs and sockets, which extend up to my hips to keep the legs on via a suction seal, cost about $305,815.