Country-music siren Martina McBride will sing “The Star-Spangled Banner” during pre-race ceremonies at the Indianapolis 500 on May 27. Most likely she will belt out the performance, much like we expected Kelly Clarkson to do at the Super Bowl here instead of offering this rather restrained take.
The 500 Festival Mini-Marathon came and went (quickly!) this past Saturday, May 5. Runners, walkers, and wheelchair racers took to the city’s downtown and near-westside streets, pounding the ground for competition, for personal health, for charity, and with the intent, for some, of clocking personal-best times.
Imagine if you will: It’s Friday, and you’ve just finished lunch. You step outside; the sun is shining, and a gentle breeze tousles your hair. You don’t want to go back to the office, so you decide to play hooky and while away the rest of the afternoon at the track. It’s a May tradition as true as Mother’s Day.
Since I ran the inaugural Indiana University Mini-Marathon on my 25th birthday in 2006, I have been slightly obsessed with half-marathons, and road races of all distances. I have now run three Indy Minis, as well as innumerable 5-milers and 5Ks, including the 2007 Indy Mini Day’s 5K, that just three and a half months after I was in a fairly serious car wreck.
As you might have heard, another big May race, the Kentucky Derby, is coming up this Saturday. For the first time ever, Indianapolis Motor Speedway and Churchill Downs have partnered to offer a special “Horsepower vs. Horsepower” (get it?) ticket promotion to race fans and revelers hearty enough to attempt trips to the Derby and the 500 in the same year.
A: TV’s Gomer Pyle owes his pre-race role to an incident in 1972, when legendary Speedway boss Anton “Tony” Hulman asked him to participate in the opening ceremonies. But Tony didn’t approach him months in advance like regular folks would. Instead he walked up to Nabors (who was attending the ’72 race as a spectator) and asked him if he’d like to “sing the song.” Nabors, figuring it was “The Star-Spangled Banner,” said yes. It wasn’t until moments before his performance that he learned it was “Back Home Again in Indiana.” Ever the trouper, he wrote the lyrics on his hand and delivered a bang-up performance, earning a gig he’s honored for the better part of four decades. [Editor’s Note: Nabors won’t make it to the 2012 Indy 500 due to medical reasons.]
JR Hildebrand spotted the starter’s white flag. “Bring it home, baby, bring it home,” chirped the rookie’s support staff over the radio from their perch in the pits. Four left turns away from winning the 2011 Indianapolis 500, Hildebrand buried the rush of excitement. No one, he told himself, cares who leads lap No. 199 at Indy. In the ether, though, the announcer’s voice on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Radio Network was already rising. Here he goes, the final lap! Across the line, JR Hildebrand will see the white flag.
To kick off the 500 Festival, Indy is throwing a party. The Rev Your Engines concert on Monument Circle tonight features headliners the Plain White T’s (9 p.m., Sat., free), the pop-rock crooners whose recent hits are by now as familiar and well-worn as, well, your favorite white T-shirt. Their heartstring-tugging ballads “Hey There Delilah,” “1, 2, 3, 4,” and “Rhythm of Love” have each gone platinum.
As basketball season begins this month, Zeller—ranked 15th in the nation among freshmen by Rivals.com—will need to stand out. But don’t expect the happy-go-lucky teenager to take any of it too seriously. At a freshman rally in Assembly Hall the first week of classes, Zeller addressed a full house. No doubt, many of the students came hungry for 20-win predictions. But Zeller gave them only his carefree smile and a vague pro-mise. “I told them it’s going to be an exciting year,” he says. Hoosiers fans certainly hope so.
