INDIANAPOLIS — Attending the Indianapolis 500 for the first time can be a life-changing experience.
The 103rd edition of The Greatest Spectacle in Racing will be my 33rd in person and my 31st as a professional. That number pales in comparison to many others who have been attending for 50, 60, 70, even 80 or more years. God willing, I’ll keep attending the Indianapolis 500 for many more years.
My personal journey to the Indianapolis 500 began before I could even realize it.
It was in the early 1960s when I was too young to remember most things growing up in the northern Indiana community of Koontz Lake. The youngest of five kids, I was the last of the line for a hardworking ironworker named Homer Martin. It was a great time to be a kid because my mother, Dorothy, was a full-time mom and housewife, so I had the traditional “Leave it to Beaver” type of upbringing.
Dad wasn’t much of a gearhead and wasn’t a race fan. But growing up in Indiana, everyone knew about the Indianapolis 500.
Even though I lived in the same state as the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, it may as well have been as far away as the moon.
So, like most of America, I discovered the Indianapolis 500 through Sid Collins’ voice on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Radio Network and later on ABC, first as part of “Wide World of Sports” and eventually through same-day coverage later that night.
I attended Indiana University beginning in 1977 and the school year ended in early May, and with the race at the end of the month, many of us were already scattered across the country to be home for the summer.
Over the next few years, though, I was determined I would one day make it to the Indianapolis 500. To me, it was Indy 500 or bust.
Finally, in 1981, I made sure that one way or another I was going to the Indianapolis 500. I had a few college buddies from South Bend that were already going to the race, so I joined. We met on the north side of Indianapolis where we attended a house party before making the trek to 38th Street and Lafayette Road.
I was amazed that traffic had come to a complete stop at Lafayette and 30th Street. We were still several miles from the “North 40” as it was called back then. It was midnight, and the gates would not open until 5 a.m.
The atmosphere was like Woodstock must have been, with tens of thousands of people all with the same goal — getting into the infield at 5 a.m. and staking out a spot for the Indy 500.
I got as close as possible to the fence inside of the fourth turn and threw down the blanket at 7 a.m. The sights and sounds were amazing as fans continued to drink and fire up grills.
There was plenty happening in the infield to keep us entertained as the Cavalcade of Bands marched around the track and the booming voice of Tom Carnegie was on the public-address system. As 11 a.m. neared, the traditional ceremonies began, although from our vantage point you couldn’t see them.
Finally, the command was given to start engines and the sound of 33 engines was heard off in the distance.
It wasn’t until the first parade lap that 22 years of waiting became a reality as the pace cars drove by with the field of 33 cars close behind. The sights, the sounds and the colors were incredible.
The first time past at speed the cars were so fast and so loud it was hard to imagine there was actually a man strapped inside of each one. It was an adrenalin rush I had waited a lifetime to experience. That was when the Indianapolis 500 became an addiction to me.
Bobby Unser won in controversial fashion for his third Indy 500 victory. I jumped in the car after the race and drove back to Koontz Lake, hoping to get home in time to see the race again on ABC.
I returned again as a spectator in 1982 and watched Gordon Johncock edge Rick Mears in what at the time was the closest finish in the history of the race.
I thought I would be attending the Indy 500 every year but after getting my degree in journalism from Indiana University in 1982, my career path took me to North Carolina to cover NASCAR racing.
Every Memorial Day weekend, I was covering a race, but it was the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway. I remember wise cracks from the old-school NASCAR media for me listening to the Indy 500 on the radio inside the CMS press box.
I later became a beat writer covering the Charlotte Hornets NBA team and was allowed to cover the Indianapolis 500, which I did for the first time in 1989.
I haven’t missed an Indianapolis 500 since, working the event for outlets such as SPEED SPORT, Autoweek, NBC Sports.com, FOX Sports.com, United Press International, ESPN SportsTicker and SportsIllustrated.com. Since 2010, I have assisted Fox59 Indianapolis in its coverage of the Month of May.
From a sporting perspective, race day at the Indianapolis 500 is as big as Christmas when I was a kid.
Attending it for the first time in 1981 certainly was my “life-changing experience.”