Why Fans REALLY Love the Indy 500 | FanAmp Insider

Introduction [0:00]

Clips from various fan interviews featured later in the episode.

Welcome to race day at the Indy 500! [0:29]

Greg:   It's 6 a.m. and a cannon just signaled the start of the largest single-day sporting event in the world.

Logan: In just a few hours, these grounds are going to be filled with over 350,000 race fans on a pilgrimage from all 50 states and over 38 countries.

Claudia: In the end, one driver will win, etching their name into the history books with legends like Emerson Fittipaldi, Helio Castroneves, and Mario Andretti. But the racing isn't only thing that's keeping them around. We're here to find out what's keeping fans coming back after over 109 years.

Logan: And why they keep passing on this tradition to generations.

Greg: And ultimately what the "Greatest Spectacle in Racing" is really all about.

Meeting the fans [1:18]

Logan: Could you explain a little bit about where we are right now?

Fan 1: So we are at the best spectacle of racing in the whole world. This is the biggest and largest world sport event in the world. The only thing that beats this event is maybe a soccer game somewhere. But this is the biggest crowd America can put together at one time. And it's all focused around this [drinking] and racing.

Logan: How many times have you been to the Indy 500?

Fan 2: I've been coming to the Indy 500 since I was a kid.

Fan 3: Five times.

Fan 4: This is my tenth year!

Fan 5: This is our eleventh Indy 500.

Fan 6: Twelve years.

Fan 7: Fifteen years maybe.

Fan 8: Twenty-six, maybe twenty-seven? A lot.

Big Rick and Friends: Probably thirty years.

Fan 9: I have been coming since 2009.

Fan 4: Best ten years of my life! It is my personality!

Logan: So, how long have you guys been coming to the Indy 500?

Fan 10: Thirty-four years.

Fan 11: This will be my thirty-third year, but coming since the 70th running.

Logan: What keeps you guys coming back? Why is this race special and why does it keep you coming back for thirty years?

Fan 11: Always something different. Every year, whether it's Carb Day or the race. In the race, there's always a different winner, winning in a different way. Who would've thought the last two years [that Josef Newgarden would win twice consecutively].

Fan 10: For me, it's my best friends. We all come together, and we don't see each other for a whole year because we do see each other here. We get together for this race year after year.

Meet Big Rick and his friends [2:42]

Greg: Take us through it, what's the whole set up here?

Big Rick: Well, we came together, probably thirty years ago.

Greg: And you didn't know each other beforehand?

Big Rick: No, we met here! We go back to the first couple of Brickyards. As the story goes, we looked at each other and go, "Well, I guess we're going to get along from here!"

Greg: What gets you guys excited about this weekend every year?

Big Rick: It's just the excitement of the race. I don't know that I could come down here and just watch the race. It's the event, and everything leading up to it. So we all come together, and I have a lot of friends who come to visit us. So this is an event about bringing people together, which is really awesome. When you think about it, bringing people together for an event like this, to enjoy it and leave with a feeling of an accomplishment that we all did this together and we all enjoyed each other, is what the world's all about.

Chris and the Fowling campsite [3:51]

Chris: My name is Chris and we are in the Coke Lots here at the Indy 500, and it's the best place to be!

Greg: But where are we specifically? I know we're in Lot 1A...

Chris: This is our campsite, for the last thirty-one years. This is the twenty-second Super Fowl, our first tournament here was in '04 and we are group of Detroiters, Indianans, Pittsburgh, Ohio, everybody here, it's like a big family reunion. It's my favorite weekend of the year and we're only going to miss it for a funeral.

Why is the Indy 500 so special? [4:26]

Claudia: What's the most special thing so far?

Fan 12: The people are amazing, I love everybody!

Fan 13: We love the atmosphere, we love the pagentry, the tradition, just all of it.

Greg: You're not the first person to actually say pageantry, it's a very specific word, what does that mean, what is it?

Fan 13: The pre-race, all the traditions, the milk, everything that goes along with it. I think it's uniquely Indy 500 and everything that we're about.

Greg: So, you've done Carb Day a lot, what does this day mean to you?

Fan 3: For me, I grew up in Kansas City, Missouri, so I didn't experience anything with the Indianapolis 500 until I moved here after college for a job. So I had the Chiefs, the Kansas City Chiefs, and so much of my soul is there, and then I experienced this and it is the exact same feeling. It is so inspiring and so cool to be a part of, I don't know what it is about it, but I can't wait for it every single year, it's just like a family tradition.

Greg: What's your favorite part of Carb Day?

Fan 3: I would just saw that we have a chief mechanic that we love dearly, he always makes an effort to fist bump the kids. When they see kids they will take a break, acknowledge them, I just think they really build that family memory for them and it makes us feel great.

Traveling across the world JUST for the Indy 500 [5:54]

Greg: You flew in for the race?

Aaron: Specifically for this event.

Glenn: We have come a long way and we took the long way around too! And we are loving our time here, this is just the best party on Earth!

Aaron: We brought a little bit of a care package for Scotty because he's recently become a US citizen and we can't have too much of that, we have to remind him where he's from. So we brought him some gifts from New Zealand, met up with him the other day and gave him them, I think it kind of screwed him, it didn't help him [referencing Scotty Mac's crash in qualifying].

Greg: What were the gifts? What'd you bring him?

Aaron: Some toys for his baby, some chocolate for Karly, snacks, some dip, some tomato sauce, all the good stuff from home! Real 'Kiwi' stuff.

Greg: Why of anywhere else on the planet did you pick the Indy 500?

Aaron: It's an iconic event, we've got three 'Kiwis', so basically 10% of the field!

Glenn: Is it Scott McLaughlin, is it Scott Dixon, is it Armstrong, we got 10% of the drivers here and this is a rad time!

Aaron: It's overwhelming the size of this place, it's just incredible. The people are so friendly, you guys don't realize how good it is what you've got.

A chat with the Ed Carpenter Drivers [7:00]

Greg: You've now run this many times, and I'm curious what this entire weekend means to you?

Ed Carpenter: I mean the entire event is just so special. I've done it twenty-one times, so this will be twenty-two, and it still, after all these years, not really easy to verbalize what it means to be here on race day. The traditions and the family stories and just generational of people being here for Memorial Day weekend and the Indy 500. It's the best event in the world and Indianapolis is known for putting on great events and the Indianapolis 500 is the marquee, it's an honor and a priveledge to be a part of it and something that I never take for granted.

Christian Rasmussen: I don't think you'll ever forget your first time. Just walking around IMS in a fire suit in May, you feel like a rockstar.

Alexander Rossi: Waking up inside the track on Sunday morning and seeing this place come alive, you know, I fell in love with this event. What really makes it something amazing, that I think we all realized was in 2020 when we had the Indy 500 behind closed doors in August and it was an empty facility, and we often talk about how it's the greatest spectacle in racing, it's the people and the fans that make it the greatest spectacle. So, it's unlike anything else.

The BEST parts of the Indy 500 [8:12]

Logan: This is my first time at the Indy 500, so what would be some advice? What should I not miss while I'm here?

Fan 11: Party. Party is number one. Number 2? Don't miss the race! Watch all of it.

Fan 1: I think the best part of the race is the flyover. You can't beat the feeling.

Logan: What's your favorite thing about it?

Fan 2: The comraderie about everyone cheering on their favorite driver.

Logan: Who's your favorite driver?

Fan 2: Conor Daly.

Fan 5: Alex Palou.

Fan 12: Graham Rahal.

Fan 5: Helio, drive for five!

Fan 7: Ed Carpenter.

Fan 14: Guy knows cars, guy knows tracks.

Fan 4: It's a tough situation this year with the Penske boys...

Fan 3: Kyle Larson! Number 17!

Claudia: If one of the drivers had to officiate your wedding, who would you want?

Fan 4: Helio Castroneves. Love that guy! Love him!

Describe the feeling of the Indy 500 [9:08]

Greg: Last question for you guys. When the green flag falls, and you have 350,000 people around, describe that feeling to people who haven't been to the race before.

Big Rick: We have a big, monstrous American flag, which we hang in front, and we all stand there when they're doing the national anthem. It's extremely hard to describe.

Woody: I'm glad I wear sunglasses sometimes, because the tears come. Every single year.

Big Rick: This is my thirty-fourth year, so it's incredible. The first time I came here, I knew that I would be coming back.

Greg: Every person that we've talked to have said how, it all comes back to community, it all comes back to the people you share it with, and I think that's really important, but there's an emotion here that is really hard to describe.

Big Rick: It's amazing how it brings people together.

Greg: You know what I think it really is? I think it's that you guys bring people together around you. I think that's ultimately what it comes down to, is that, there's a race here, but you're very kind, warm, friendly people, who draw the folks in.

Friend: The race is optional for what we do!

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