Story by Butch Welsch, Photos by Dave Bulebush for TSO
It’s time to put this year’s 500 and the entire month of May to bed and move on to the rest of the Indy Car season.
These are some observations from Sunday at the Speedway.
On a pre-race grid walk, I was able to run into two gentlemen I can call my friends who I consider to be the top two Promoters on the Indy Car circuit. The first is Jim Michalien, the head of the Long Beach Grand Prix. Jim was ecstatic over their attendance this April and the interest due the fact that it was a celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Long Beach Grand Prix.
Next I saw Curtis Francois, the owner/promoter of World Wide Technology Raceway(WWTR). WWTR is right across the river from my hometown of St. Louis. Curtis has done an amazing job of promoting his events and he is especially excited to have this year’s Indy Car race on Sunday night on FOX TV. This will be the first Sunday night Indy Car race, and since it is being shown on the main FOX network, Curtis is anticipating spectacular TV ratings. Not to mention how cool the Indy cars look at night. A quick plug as our company, Welsch Heating and Cooling Co. is the presenting sponsor of the Saturday night USAC Silver Crown Race, which also includes Indy Car qualifying.
The grid walk also allowed me to say hello to the boss here at TrackSideOnline.com presented by Honda, Patrick Stephan, as he was working as spotter for Georgia Henneberry of FOX. Patrick introduced me to Georgia and I complimented her on her rise from a USAC midget and sprint car pit reporter to FOX Sports.
Georgia also revealed to me that she was from a suburb of St. Louis and she went to a high school in the same district as our kids and grandkids. Small world. A complimentary word about Georgia and Patrick. They covered miles themselves during the 500. Patrick had a recognizable salmon colored shirt and was easy to see as they moved quickly up and down pit lane and then several times to the infield Medical Center for interviews. Anyone who feels that TV work is an easy gig needs to follow them around some race days. Good job, both of you.
Once in our seats the most noticeable thing was the number of fans and the fact that there were no empty seats. It was not PR. The place truly was sold out and reminded me of many race days in the past.
The pre-race ceremonies were awesome as always, and I can’t help but mention the trumpeter who performed Taps. 350,000 people standing to hear one trumpeter from the starter’s stands hit every note perfectly gives me chills again just thinking about it.
If you’ve ever tried coordinating two things to occur at once, can you imagine the planning it took for the jet flyover to arrive from the north on the last note of the National Anthem? And then re-appear from the east on the last note of Jim Cornelson’s thrilling rendition of “Back Home Again in Indiana?
Unfortunately about that time rain drops started appearing on our clothing. We are not covered but the rain was never hard enough to make us move up under the roof. It came and went and fortunately, the cars took off on their parade laps.
Scott McLaughlin’s mistake into the wall on the main straight reminded us all of Roberto Guerrero doing the same thing from the pole position, in the second turn in 1992. The dejection Scott showed was truly hard to watch.
The pits were hectic all day. Robert Schwartzman ran into three of his pit crew members; Alexander Rossi’s car went up in big flames; several cars had brake issues including Rinus Veekay who spun into the inner pit wall but was far enough north that he didn’t contact anyone. Fortunately, despite all of the mayhem, there were no serious injuries.
Probably the first time in Speedway history, the waiting lines for the Men’s rest rooms were longer than those for the Women’s and some cases significantly longer. No explanation.
It was so neat to see the joy and enthusiasm shown by Alex Palou. He stopped on the track right below us and after standing up on his car, started running full speed to his pit which was near the south end of the track. We wondered if he was going to take his victory lap at a full run. His excitement was truly a statement as to what it means to a driver to win the Indianapolis 500.
Kudos to Alan Bestwick and Dave Calabro for terrific jobs on the track PA system. They bring both intelligence and excitement to their job and it adds greatly to the event.
Hopefully the teams with crashed cars, of which there were several, have back-up street course cars for this weekend’s Detroit race. The mechanics still have a great deal of work to do getting oval cars ready for the June 15th race at WWTR.
It was probably only fitting that the craziness which highlighted this month of May, didn’t end on Sunday. It ended (hopefully) on Monday with the announcement of disqualifications to the cars of Callum Ilot, Marcus Ericsson, and Kyle Kirkwood, placing them at the end of the field.
I’m already looking forward to the 110th running of the 500 – and wondering if anyone else will have won a race besides Alex Palou. Enjoy the rest of the season!