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I'm watching the pre race for Indy 500. Sure there will be a fly over, but I really like past ones where long time EAA warbird member Tom Wood used to lead in his P-51. I'm not sure who else had done that, most probably Vlado, maybe Doug R etc. Tom was an auto dealer in Indianapolis car dealer and owned a 51, F-86 and I think maybe Citation. Nice guy.
The race has 300,000 people like 5 times that of Ariventure. Ive never been,would like to.
The first woman to ever race the 500, Janet Guthrie is a local lady and a friend of mine. Shes a pilot also as was her husband. A smart determined lady, with a sense of humor.
A J Foyt went my same high school, Houston Lamar, was few years ahead of me, in my older Brother's class. I used to date his wife's younger sister, and was once invited to the race. I almost went, and should have, that year as a rookie AJ won the race and is one of 3 men who have one it 4 times.
I've seen numbers for the the Indy 500 approaching 500,000 which makes it the single biggest spectator event in the US.
World wide it has a ways to go to catch events like the Tour de France bicycle race with has >10 million spectators. That is absolutely amazing.
Indy is only about 350,000 really, but it's still the largest in any one place. The TdF only counts in the millions when you aggregate the attendance over the 23 day race. I don't think any of the individual stages beats Indy and even then the stages are spread out over between 9 and 138 (for 2017) miles. The next biggest you get are some of the larger soccer games.
Good to hear Janet Guthrie is still doing well. I remember watching her debut back when I was a teen.
Went to Bloomington Gold and got to do a few laps in the Corvette.
"Only about 350,000? I think that is a big, no huge only. I cant imagine a crowd that big. How do they handle all the transportation in, maybe a lot of buses? Where do they park all the cars? Do people have to walk for miles?
The largest event that Ive been to is football games. U of Texas stadium holds 102,000 people and I ve been there when it was full, back in the last decade when they actually used to win most games. And you have to walk bout half mile if you can even find parking and big lines at concession and rest room. I was leaving a game one night, 100k people and most wearing orange and chanting a mantra, and I get the feeling that I'm part of cult.
About that same number attend our lakefront "Taste of Chicago" each of the 5 days it's open. LOTS of long walking, LOTS of long lines for everything to include 'convenience stops'. Porta-potties galore but still long waits. Public transit delays, gang issues, and your personal chance to smell every hot, damp human on the planet. Mmmmmm boy... sign me up …...not. lol
You have to understand that the Indy speedway is MUCH LARGER than even the largest of the football stadiums. The track itself is 2.5 miles long which makes the infield roughly ten times the size of a football field. There are parking lots all around the place plus a large number of people are camping in the infield. Yes, it is a zoo getting out of there.
My comment about "Only" was a response to the previous estimate that it was 500,000.
This article in USA Today from 2013 says the capacity of the Speedway is 235,000. Adding an infield party area, general admission and workers brings the total number of people there to about 250,000 for the big race.
It's still the biggest event in the world "at a given time." The biggest football (soccer) events are just under 200,000. The TdF doesn't get anywhere near that dense.