Last weekend, more than 150,000 people gathered in Louisville, Ky. to watch 20 horses run America's most celebrated horserace. Tomorrow opens the two-week qualifying buildup to America's most notorious motorized race: the Indianapolis 500.
While the owners of the Indianapolis Speedway have never released official figures, the Associated Press has claimed a crowd of 400,000 strong, while more recent conservative estimates have the number a bit over 250,000. While some events attract more spectators over a longer period of time, the Indy 500 is the most heavily attended single-day sporting event in the world.
On May 28, the Indianapolis Speedway will host its 90th annual race. By the 1920s the race was attracting upwards of 80,000 people, which means that over the entire span of its existence, more people have visited the Speedway than live in all of the state of Florida.
With such enormous attendance numbers, one would expect the Indy 500 to be the most popular sporting event over Memorial Day weekend. And while viewers will turn out in full to watch the race on ESPN2, it will not be so obvious how much change the open-wheel racing circuit has gone through in the past 10 years.
The Indy 500 is the centerpiece of open-wheel racing. As its oldest and most recognized event, the decisions of its owners and organizers have had a tremendous impact on not just their own race, but all other races on the circuit as well.
Its grip over the sport is so strong that, after participating in 11 years of organized open-wheel racing on the Championship Auto Racing Teams (CART) series, the owner of the Speedway decided he wanted to start a new racing circuit with his race as the premiere event. So he founded the Indy Racing League, or IRL, to compete against the CART series, which would no longer include the Indy 500.
The decision was not immediately successful, as CART continued to hold a consistent calendar of races, and the IRL reinforced its image of inferior racing by confusing its schedule so much that one season lasted three months, while the next lasted 17.
To compete with the IRL in the absence of an event as recognizable as the Indy 500, CART set up the U.S. 500, to be raced on the same day as the Indy. Proving Indy's staying power, after a few years the U.S. 500 was moved to a different day and eventually disappeared altogether. Between 2000 and 2001, two of the biggest race teams in CART racing switched to the IRL circuit, and not long after CART went bankrupt.
This was a bold move from Tony George, the owner of the Speedway. He could have killed the Indy 500 with his decision to split from the established racing series. Instead, his move proved savvy, and now both his race and his circuit are on top. But even if CART had prevailed, open-wheel racing is showing some scarring from all of the past decade's instability.
Most people will be able to tell you the difference between the Kentucky Derby and the Indy 500, even if they've never watched either event. Like the Derby, the event seems to ignite more passions on the premises than in living rooms.
Television interest for the race has fallen over 50 percent in the past 10 years, while the ratings for NASCAR's Daytona 500 have risen by almost as much. NASCAR has added five races to its circuit, while the IRL had to withdraw from three. Fewer races and fewer television viewers mean less exposure, and in the end, less advertising money. After a decade of trying to outmuscle the opponent, it looks like open-wheel racing may have shot itself in the foot.
So how can the sport save itself from collapse? One idea would be to incorporate all of the remaining Champ Series races -- the remnants of the liquidated CART series -- into the IRL so there is no inter-sport competition and all of the advertising money is feeding one source.
The other is to figure out how to get more high profile drivers on the track winning races. Even though Danica Patrick finished fourth in least year's race, her attempt to capture the pole in qualifying was enough to significantly boost the race-day ratings.
But most Americans, no matter how uninterested in car racing they may be, could still probably name three NASCAR drivers for every one IRL driver. That is, assuming they know any IRL drivers at all.
