I don’t know the first time I went to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
The first house I lived in was on Fuller Drive, which is off 30th Street
across from the Coke field. From there I could easily hear the race cars. I
remember taking my cars – an assortment of Tootsie toys, Hot Wheels and
Matchbox, almost none of which looked like an Indy car - and playing with them
on the back porch while the real racers roared around the track.
(“The track,” by the way, is how people in Indianapolis refer to the
Indianapolis Motor Speedway.)
So I’m guessing that a gentle suggestion and/or incessant whining led
my parents to take me to see where all the noise was coming from and what the
fuss is all about.
My best guess would be when I was 3 and maybe we wandered down to Turn
1- inside the old main gate – to watch tire testing in the spring.
Certainly I was there in 1972 as Bobby Unser’s gleaming Olsonite Eagle
made quite an impression on me.
From that point, I was hooked. I would hurry home to hear the track
reports from Lou Palmer on WIBC. I pored over the articles in the Indianapolis
News and Indianapolis Star. (When I moved out of state, I got the monthly
subscription to The Star.) I watched “Trackside 6.” I listened to “The Talk of
Gasoline Alley” (still do, actually).
I’ve been going ever since. No matter where I lived – West Lafayette,
Indiana; Logansport, Indiana; Springfield, Missouri; Portage, Indiana; or
Canton, Michigan – I made it a point to make the trek back to 16th and
Georgetown for practice or qualifying, if not the actual race.
Later, I brought my children. In an example of the lugnut not falling
far from the tire, they immediately scampered down the hill in the infield to
get next to the fence to watch the cars accelerate down the backstretch out of
Turn 2.
Saturday, my son and I will leave for Indianapolis to be trackside for the
first day of practice for this year’s Indianapolis 500.
On the way down, I will treat him to another edition of my oft-told
tales of the Unsers, Mario Andretti, A.J. Foyt, Johnny Rutherford, Rick Mears,
Tom Sneva, Gordon Johncock, Mike Mosley, Peter Revson, Mark Donohue and the
other drivers of my youth.
As well as Eagles, McLarens, Coyotes, Dragons and Parnellis.
Offenhausers and Coyote V-8s. Sponsors like Gulf, Sunoco, STP, Sugaripe Prune,
Cobre, Bryant, Gilmore and Thermo-King.
When cars were still called “specials.” Or had clever names. The Norton
Spirit. The American Kids Racer. The Pepsi Challenger. The Texaco Star.
I hope someday he does the same with his son, telling him about Will
Power, Scott Dixon, Tony Kanaan, Helio Castroneves and Dan Wheldon.
It’s May. Finally.
