Renault's Kubica hopes to leave hospital 'very soon'
William Burgess Robert Kubica is expected to leave hospital and start intensive rehabilitation with Renault team consultant Dr Riccardo Ceccarelli.
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- Robert Kubica hopes to leave hospital soon after months recovering from rally crash
- Renault driver will start rehabilitation after resting at his Monaco home
- Kubica's stand-in Nick Heidfeld helps Renault to good start after placing third in Malaysia
(CNN) -- Formula One driver Robert Kubica has announced that he will leave hospital soon as he continues to recover from injuries sustained in a crash at an Italian rally race in February.
The Pole has spent two and a half months in Santa Corona hospital in Italy, where he had four operations to correct multiple fractures to his arm and leg, and to a severed hand, after the high-speed crash near the town of Testico.
"I am starting to feel a lot better now," he said in a message to fans on his team Lotus Renault's website.
F1 star Kubica faces 'long recovery'
"My recovery is moving in the right direction. My strength and weight are increasing day on day, and as a result I will leave the hospital very soon.
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"I don't have a precise date as yet, but I hope to be able to leave within the next 10 days."
Renault team consultant Dr Riccardo Ceccarelli, who runs the Italian sports clinic Formula Medicine, will take over Kubica's supervision when he begins an intense rehabilitation program following a short period of rest at his home in Monaco.
The mobility of the 26-year-old's hand is still a cause for concern, but Kubica maintained that the condition is improving every day.
"This is pretty normal in this kind of situation, because the connected arm muscles are still very weak due to the long period of immobility," he said.
Nick Heidfeld is currently standing in for Kubica at Renault, which has made an encouraging start to the season, with the German and Vitaly Petrov both placing third in Malaysia and Australia respectively.
Kubica, whose accident came three days after he set the fastest time at the first pre-season F1 test in Valencia, made his F1 debut at the Hungarian Grand Prix in August 2006.
He won the Canadian Grand Prix two years later with BMW Sauber as he finished fourth in the drivers' championship, his best result, before joining Renault in 2010.
