The Indy 500. Still great

It used to be known as "the greatest spectacle in racing" and, indeed, it probably was. Nothing got American race fans juiced like the Indianapolis 500.

I first got hooked on the Indy 500 back in the 70s. Used to go every year and camp out in the infield. Besides the race itself being incredible -- whatta party. In those days famous names of racers abounded. Like Foyt, the Unsers, Rahal, Andretti, Dahlenback, Rutherford, and a little later on, Mears and others. Janet Guthrie became the first woman to make the field. She didn't fare well in the race, but it was somewhat historic.

At that time, NASCAR had been around a while, but wasn't all that popular yet. It was still mostly a southern phenomenon. Abroad, most race fans, particularly Europeans, preferred Formula One racing. Still do. Perhaps it could be compared to soccer vs American football. Americans preferred one, and the rest of the world preferred the other. Still do.

Then came the infamous "feud" between the powers that oversaw Indy car racing. The opposing camps dug in for years, and the sport fractured. When they finally came to their senses and reached an agreement, the fans were long gone. In the meantime, NASCAR had jumped into the void with brilliant marketing, their own big names, and "stock car" racing went through the roof. It rules north American racing to this day, by a wide margin.

Before the power struggle, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway would routinely sell out the whole place, almost half a million people, just for the time trials, let alone the race itself. That was a BIG deal. Sadly, when they tried to restore the sport, they discovered not that many people were interested in coming back. Many of the former Indy car drivers jumped to NASCAR, and some still do. Back in the day, much like NASCAR now, the Indy 500 featured mostly American teams and drivers. Now it's gone international, with racers coming from all over the globe. This may or may not be a good thing.

In days of yore, the competition to make the field was ferocious. There was a lot of nail biting going on right up to the last minute of qualifying as to who would "get in". Post-feud, there were a few years when they struggled to merely get 33 cars to show up for a full field.
The race is slowly gaining a bit of traction again, but will it ever be the can't miss "spectacle" it once was? Probably not, and that's a shame.

However, yours truly never wavered through the "bad" years. The race is going to go off again this Sunday, and I'm getting geeked already. No, I won't be leaving on Thursday for a 3 day mega-blast in Indianapolis, culminating with the race itself, like I used to. But I wouldn't miss it on TV for anything.

Besides knowing Ryan Briscoe won the "pole" I couldn't name more than a half dozen of the other racers, but it doesn't matter to me. Indy cars are Indy cars, and despite some changes over the years, they're still flat-out FAST. If you've never been there, I would highly recommend checking it out at least once, live and in person. What you see on TV does absolutely no justice to the incredible speeds those cars are travelling. Seeing it up close is breathtaking. 225 is 225, and that's a whole lot faster than anything the NASCAR drivers experience, even on the "super speedways", restrictor plates or not. At Talladega, the high-banked 2.66 mile NASCAR oval, Indy cars could probably run upward of 240. How fast is THAT? Think of standing next to a major highway and watching the traffic whiz past. That's probably pretty close to how fast the Indy cars would blow by Sprint Cup cars if they were both on the Talladega track at the same time.

So as a fan that never lost interest, I say bring it on. When Gomer Py..., ahem, Jim Nabors belts out his tradtional pre-race song of Back Home Again In Indiana, complete with the sycamore trees and the banks of the Wabash --  I'll grin like a Cheshire cat. They'll release umpteen thousand baloons and the fighter jets will make a fly-by. I'll turn off the phone. When they play the National Anthem, I might stand up, hand on heart -- in my man cave.

When the immortal words "start your engines" finally sound over the PA system, I'll get goose bumps.

Can you tell I'm still a fan?
The NBA and NHL are getting down to crunch time in their playoffs? So what. That can wait.

This is the one and only Indianapolis 500.

I am SOOO ready for this.