In this episode, we continue my series about my life as a race fan. I will follow that up shortly with a special episode where I read to you an article I wrote for Indianapolis Monthly Magazine about the first time I attended the Indy 500 in person.

Hi, this is Chris Young. Welcome to episode 68 of Contemplating Life.

In this episode, we continue my series about my life as a race fan. I will follow that up shortly with a special episode where I read to you an article I wrote for Indianapolis Monthly Magazine about the first time I attended the Indy 500 in person.

As I have explained in previous episodes, in my early 20s my disability worsened significantly. It was no longer safe for me to go anywhere unaccompanied. That not only affected my ability to go to the movies alone or to roam my neighborhood, but it also meant I would not be safe alone all day at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. My mom knew how important these visits were to me and she agreed to help me continue my tradition. She would come with me on practice and qualifying days.

She would get me up in the morning and in my wheelchair. We would load up the van and head to the track arriving around noon. There was handicapped parking available in the parking lot in front of the Hall of Fame Museum located in the infield between the first and second turns. There was a snack bar there as well as a gift shop. We would grab a bite to eat and the snack bar before proceeding to the track. I usually got a hot dog and Mom would get a hot dog or perhaps a braided tenderloin sandwich. We would split a bag of sour cream and onion potato chips and we each got a Coke.

We would then either go to the handicapped seating area in front of the Museum or walk over to the main straightaway and head for the garage area known as Gasoline Alley. Mom would sit in the grandstand and watch the cars and the activity in the pits. I would go after the garage area to shoot video. We planned to meet about once an hour at a designated spot behind the grandstand.

That system worked very well for a few years but as my disability worsened, it became more difficult for me to drive over the bumpy asphalt behind the grandstands. Inside the garage area, it was smooth concrete and I had no difficulty. So we adapted by having her escort me into the garage area and then check on me there later.

Eventually, I added one more high-tech toy to my arsenal. I purchased a 200-channel scanner radio that would allow me to listen to the drivers talk to their pit crews. I could also listen to race officials and when there was live TV and radio coverage I could listen in on those broadcasts and I could hear the directors and producers cuing different reporters throughout the coverage. It was also fun to listen to what they said during the commercial breaks as well.

In May 1993, I finally got to see my first Indy 500 in person with my mom and dad. The story of that occasion is chronicled in an article I wrote for Indianapolis Monthly Magazine which I will read to you in a special bonus episode following this one. I’ve already spoiled some of the stories from that article so I don’t want to say too much more about that first 500.

When I submitted the article, I included the title “A Race Fan’s First 500” but the editor decided to rename it “Being There”. I wasn’t too happy about the rename but I was happy that I got my second article published. Again what I wrote was too long but I didn’t care that they cut it this time. They got the essence of the story and I was proud to have my second sale.

I think it was sometime in February or March that I met with the magazine photographer to take a photo of me at the track. It was a cool gloomy day and I had to wear my heavy winter coat. It looks a little strange to see me sitting there at an empty track with a winter coat on but that was the photo they published with the article.

A few years later when I made my own personal website, I posted an online version of the article that was much longer. It includes photographs I took that day. I’ve included some of those photos in the YouTube version although many of them had been shrunk down to low resolution and I don’t have the originals to rescan.

Our seats on race day were in the new wheelchair platform that ran along the grandstand from the beginning of the third turn, down the north short chute, and into the fourth turn. Our seats were at the beginning of the fourth turn. This platform was just 10 feet or so from the steel catch fence that arose out of the outer retaining wall. It was a bit scary being that close to the action but we were at the part of the turn where the cars were already on the high side of the track and beginning to dive down low to the apex of the corner. So the cars were angling away from us. Had we been sitting at the exit of the corner it would’ve been scarier as the cars drifted outwards towards us. When they lose control in a corner, it is generally the exit of the corner where they hit the wall.

The catch fence consisted of massive steel poles embedded in the concrete worlds. They were strung with cables nearly an inch thick as well as heavy-duty fencing material. The only thing that could’ve gotten through that fence would have been small pieces of debris unless something went over the top of the fence. In that event, the people further up in the grandstand would’ve been at greater risk than we were immediately in front of the fence. So I felt relatively safe.

Again I will leave the details of that first 500 for the article I will read next time.

I have lots of fond memories of those days when Mom and I went to the track to watch practice. One especially cool thing we witnessed was the landing of several military helicopters in the Museum parking lot. The third Saturday of May is designated as Armed Forces Day. As part of those festivities at the Speedway, the military brings in helicopters, jeeps, tanks, and other equipment and puts them on display in the Museum parking. You can get up close and personal with the equipment and of course, there are recruiters there anxious to sign you up for military service.

So, one time on the Friday before an Armed Forces Day, we were at the track until it closed at 6 PM. We were headed back to the van parked on the west side of the Museum parking lot as the military was moving in on the east side. We watched two helicopters land in the parking lot and the grass east of the Museum. One was a giant twin-rotor Chinook transport helicopter. The other was a Huey combat helicopter.

The scary thing was, the Huey was landing in the parking lot between some tall lamp posts. Someone on the ground was spotting for them and waving them in. I got to thinking if one of those rotor blades hits the lamppost. It could fly 100 yards to where we were watching. I wasn’t sure we were safe. Fortunately, nothing went wrong but it was a great experience I will never forget. I’m pretty sure I’ve got some video of that event but I can’t find it right now. I probably have not yet transferred from VHS to my computer.

For the next decade or so, we not only attended the Indy 500 but the NASCAR Brickyard 400 starting in the first year In 1994. The Brickyard race was typically held in late July or early August. For several years in a row, the weather was just too hot and humid. Neither I nor my parents could handle that kind of heat. We gave our tickets to one of my sisters. Eventually, we realized we just weren’t up to seeing the race under such conditions and we quit renewing our Brickyard tickets.

I think my mom was a bit nervous going to that first race with me. Although she had been to the track with me many times in recent years this was the first race she had attended since the tragedy in 1964 when drivers Eddie Sachs and Dave MacDonald were killed in a horrific fiery crash. I imagine she was also ambivalent about coming to the track at all with me for fear she might see something terrible happen again. But she put those fears aside because she knew it was the only way I could get to the track and she wanted to help me preserve that tradition that I loved so much.

Unfortunately, Mom and I were there at the Speedway for two additional fatal accidents. We didn’t see either of them but we did hear them.

On May 15, 1982, Mom and I went to qualifications accompanied by her friend Georgianna who she had met through her disability advocacy work with an organization called COVOH. We’ve talked about that before. Georgianna had her 12-year-old disabled daughter Teresa with her.

For some reason, we picked a spot outside the third turn that day. I don’t know why we didn’t go to the handicapped seating area. Perhaps it hadn’t been built yet… I don’t recall.

Anyway, driver Gordon Smiley was on a warm-up lap before his qualifying run. I saw him go by me at the entrance of the third turn but did not follow him around into the short straight and into four because he wasn’t yet qualifying. I looked away to say something to Mom when I heard the crash. I looked up quickly and all I could see was a cloud of debris rolling down the track. Nothing remained that even remotely resembled a racecar. Later at home, watching the video of the crash you could see clearly that the car had completely disintegrated. You could also see the driver’s helmet rolling down the track. There was fan speculation that his head was still inside the helmet. However, I read an article years later talking about the crash. One of the officials saw a strange gray substance smeared on the track. It was human brains. The driver was not decapitated but his skull was completely crushed. He died instantly.

Gordon Smiley was not a very personable individual. He rarely gave interviews and when he did, he answered with simple yes and no replies. They didn’t have any good file footage to replay after he died. The media interviewed other drivers looking for some sort of anecdote or remembrance of him. They would struggle saying something like, “Well… He was sort of a loner. Didn’t hang out much with the other drivers and was kind of hard to get to know. But we sure are sorry to lose him.” It seemed like they were struggling to find something nice to say about him.

On May 17, 1996, Mom and I were getting out of my van in the Museum parking lot. Just as I got off the wheelchair lift, we heard a crash in the second turn nearby. We couldn’t see it. The PA announcer said that it was driver Scott Brayton. We saw a replay on a giant video board. It didn’t look like a very severe crash. He blew his right rear tire and did a half spin before hitting the wall at 230 mph. Brayton had already qualified for the pole position and this was just pre-race practice. He was removed from the vehicle unconscious and taken to Methodist Hospital. Initially, there were no reports about his condition except that he had been transported. Mom and I both feared the worst. A few hours later, I heard a race official on my scanner radio ask, “When are they going to make the announcement?”

The reply was, “They still have one more notification to make before they go public.”

A half-hour later, the PA announcer said, “Ladies and Gentlemen may I have your attention please.” The only time they ever use that wording is to announce a death. Mom had heard those words in 1964, we both heard them in 1982 and now we were hearing them again.

There was a significant contrast between Scott Brayton and Gordon Smiley. Brayton was very popular with fans and drivers alike and was active in many charity events in the community. After his death, they named an award after him for drivers who embodied his spirit not only as a racer but as a charitable person.

As my parents and I aged, the trip to the race each May became more and more difficult. It was harder on me to be out in the elements whether it was too hot or too cold. It was physically draining on all three of us.

Also, the traffic patterns changed. While we could get into the Speedway easily using a handicapped parking pass which led us in a special gate, getting out became more difficult. Rather than allowing us to turn north onto Georgetown Road and head towards our house, they would force us to turn south out of gate 9 into a line of traffic that was forced to go most of the way downtown before we could turn back towards our house. They had all of the sidestreets blocked so you had to stay in that line of traffic out of the area. One year, it took us over two hours to get back home because we were stuck in traffic going away from our house.

We eventually found a way to wait for the crowd to dissipate a bit and make our way out the 30th St. gates. From there we could get to a sidestreet. One time, Mom got out of the van and moved a barricade so we could cut through the neighborhood and get back home.

Another issue conspired to make “being there” a less enjoyable experience. As my disability worsened, it became difficult for me to hold my head up, especially with heavy headphones on. If I leaned my head backward onto my headrest, it made it impossible for me to push the buttons on my scanner radio. I would push the buttons using a small wooden stick that I held in my mouth. I needed to be able to move my head forward to push the buttons. Sometimes you want to pause the radio on a particular channel and I couldn’t do that with my head leaned back against the headrest. The wheelchair platform where I sat would bounce a little bit as people walked by behind me. This would cause my head would fall backward when the platform bounced. It was quite frustrating.

The last straw came in October 2003 when rookie driver Tony Renna was killed during a private Firestone tire test in the off-season in preparation for the 2004 race. He crashed exiting the third turn and became airborne. He crashed into the catch fence tearing down a couple of those heavy steel poles that I had counted for protecting me on for years. The steel poles and fencing collapsed onto the wheelchair seating area about 100 yards east of where my seats were. Had this accident occurred on race day, people sitting in the wheelchair section in the middle of the north short chute and they certainly would have been killed.

IndyCar made changes to the rules to attempt to keep the cars from becoming airborne and over the years there have been fewer airborne incidents and nothing else has damaged the catch fence that severely.

I struggled to enjoy the 2004 race because I couldn’t keep my head held up and couldn’t operate my scanner radio. I also had fears about the safety of the fence, and my deteriorating stamina made it difficult to endure such an event. I made the difficult decision that I would not be back again. 2004 was my last Indy 500 in person.

I still watch the race every year on TV. Even though it’s blacked out and tape-delayed here in Indianapolis for many years I was able to find a bootleg live stream online. When NBC started the Peacock TV streaming service, they were not smart enough to include the blackout online so people in Indianapolis could watch it live on Peacock streaming even though the network broadcast was blacked out. Last year they wised up and blocked central Indiana IP addresses during the event. I just logged into a VPN and spoofed my location to watch it.

The idea that you can stream the race live in high definition over the Internet is just an example of how far we’ve come technologically.

Before I started going to the race in person, my family typically spent Memorial Day weekend at our lakeside cabin on Cordry Lake about 50 miles south of here. Sometimes if the weather was right, we could turn the roof antenna on the cabin and pick up a TV station out of Louisville Kentucky, or perhaps Terre Haute Indiana, and avoid the blackout and see the race live on TV. Unfortunately, this was on a 25-inch analog TV that would get a very snowy picture and you could barely see what was going on.

A couple of years ago when they started streaming the race on Peacock, my friend Jack who bought out my family’s share of the lakeside property, sent me a photo from the lake on Memorial Day. They had carried a 45-inch HD flatscreen down to the boat dock and were streaming the race in HD using a 4G hotspot. A far cry from where we were 40 years ago.

I mentioned previously that they renamed my article from, “A Race Fan’s First 500” to the phrase “Being There” and I didn’t like the name change. But now that I can no longer be there, I have a different appreciation of how important those words are. I’m in way worse condition these days than I was in 2004 when we quit going. There’s no way I could be there now. But I try to maintain my connection to the Speedway.

During the pre-race ceremonies, there is always a military flyby. It flies over the Speedway from North to South directly down the main stretch. As it approaches the Speedway, the flight path is about three blocks east of my house. So for the Indy 500 and Brickyard, I like to go outside across the street and hang out with the neighbors as we watch the jets fly by. It’s not as spectacular as seeing them fly directly over your head at the track with 300,000 people but somehow it keeps me connected personally to the event. It’s my way to continue being there.

For our next episode, I’m going to read the article that I wrote for Indianapolis Monthly Magazine. That will wrap up this series on my life as a race fan. After that, I will return to stories about my college days at IUPUI.

If you find this podcast educational, entertaining, enlightening, or even inspiring, consider sponsoring me on Patreon for just $5 per month. You will get early access to the podcast and other exclusive content. Although I have some financial struggles, I’m not really in this for money. Still, every little bit helps.

As always, my deepest thanks to my financial supporters. Your support means more to me than words can express.

Even if you cannot provide financial support. Please, please, please post the links and share this podcast on social media so that I can grow my audience. I just want more people to be able to hear my stories.

All of my back episodes are available and I encourage you to check them out if you’re new to this podcast. If you have any comments, questions, or other feedback please feel free to comment on any of the platforms where you found this podcast.

I will see you next time as we continue contemplating life. Until then, fly safe.